His anger is a dead giveaway of the unhappiness in party ranks over the ``arranged'' marriage with the TDP. Whichever way you look at it--top-down or bottom-up--the state BJP is one hell of a reluctant bride, not ready for marriage but going through with it for the sake of its Delhi parent.

Unlike in Karnataka, where the state unit made a song and dance before settling down to political matrimonial realities, the Andhra Pradesh unit is simmering from within: angry that the central party sacrificed it at the altar of ``national interest''; that it failed to see through the ``conspiracy'' of Chandrababu Naidu to ``finish off'' the BJP in Andhra; and that it is back where it began three years ago.

There is much merit in this. In the 1996 Lok Sabhaelections, the BJP polled four per cent of the total vote (but did not win a seat). That gave the party the hope. The Congress was still down in the dumps and the space of an opposition party was virtually unoccupied. In the same election, the BJP was returned as the single largest party at the centre. The environment of success around the BJP helped build its image. New members rushed in, including leading lights of the tinsel world such as Vijayashanti, a big draw in the state where politics is played out on the silver screen before it hits the road.

The straws in the wind were enough. The BJP launched a blistering anti-TDP campaign, attacking the Naidu government day in and day out and when general election 1998 happened, the results were dramatic: the party captured four seats and polled 18 per cent of the total vote. An unbelievable hike of 14 percentage points over 1996.

``This was the biggest jump in BJP voter-base anywhere in the country and it happened,'' emphasises the senior leader, ``in spiteof the fact that Andhra was the only state where the BJP had no alliance in the 1998 election. It was clear that we were attracting disenchanted voters from both the Congress and the TDP.''

It was clear, too, that the BJP was beginning to move into the political space yielded by the Congress in the state post-Babri masjid.

But victory came gift-wrapped in compromise. The BJP needed every seat it could muster to form the government at the centre and the TDP had a good 12. Overnight, from being the TDP's most bitter critic, the BJP became almost an accomplice.

``All the good work of the previous 15 months was lost. Because of the support he lent us at the centre we had to freeze our attacks on Naidu's government. Our credibility suffered and the thick inflow into the party practically dried out,'' rues the leader. And for Chandrababu Naidu, it was a win-win situation: he would enjoy the benefits of having a friendly government at the centre and keep the state BJP in check.

If the 1998 post-electiontie-up with TDP at the centre was highly embarrassing for the state unit, the 1999 pre-poll alliance, partymen are convinced, virtually comes with a seal of death.

As against the state unit's hopes of bagging upwards of 60 seats in the Assembly, it ended up with only 24. ``We were strong enough to contest all the 294 seats. But our leaders here--Venkaiah Naidu, a childhood chum of Chandrababu comes in for specific mention--have painted a picture to Delhi that we need the TDP prop. Naidu wants to kill the BJP before it emerges as a credible opposition party and our central leaders have fallen for it,'' says the man who quit TDP after Naidu's coup against NTR.

``Now there is no scope for growth in the BJP. Mind you, there can't be a vacuum in politics. The space we've vacated will be occupied by somebody else (the Congress is, already) and we'll lose our workers to them. This tie-up with the TDP has followed Naidu's script and put the BJP back by at least 15 years. We cannot hope to recreate the atmosphereof 1996 and 1998,'' he says.

The ``TDP-conspiracy'' theory is strengthened because the BJP believes that not only has its reach been contained by the TDP by yielding only 24 seats but it has been saddled with all the no-hope seats. ``We have been given the Yakutpura and Karvan assembly seats (from Hyderabad) which are totally Muslim-dominated whereas Himayatnagar (where the state BJP is headquartered) and Khairatabad, our strongholds, have been denied us,'' he argues. ``Forget about campaigning for the TDP, it's difficult to get our cadres out even to work for us.''

Of course, the TDP pooh-poohs the charges but insists the BJP central leadership was fully aware of the compromise they were making. Says Prabhakar Reddy, RS member and Naidu's most-trusted lieutenant: ``The BJP government was ousted by just one vote in the Lok Sabha. So it was more important for them to get every extra LS seat they could manage. How does it matter whether they got 24 assembly seats or 60? The BJP leadership went into the pactfully aware of these facts.''

That is the truth. And that is why it hurts the state BJP more.

The apparent lack of trust in each other is showing in the campaigning. The alliance's most important public meeting, where Prime Minister A B Vajpayee and Chandrababu Naidu shared the dais for the first time in Secunderabad on Tuesday, made news only for the crashing flop that it turned out to be. Even by BJP estimates the crowd was only about 20,000. It comprised mostly BJP workers and conspicuous by their absence were workers of the TDP. Same story at Medak the following day.

Prabhakar Reddy admits it was a poor show. ``Yes, it's true there was not enough coordination this time,'' but obliquely puts the blame on the BJP: ``Both the Secunderabad and Hyderabad LS seats are with the BJP and so are most of the assembly seats in the city, that's why we thought they would be making the arrangments.''

With campaigning for the first phase on September 5 already coming to a close, there's no hope of bettercoordination. Only prayers in BJP hearts that the TDP does not do as well as the opinion polls indicate. As one leader put it: ``We're hoping the Congress does well. Only then do we have a future.''

The fight in Andhra, clearly, is as much between friends as it is against the enemy.