New Delhi: Former Andhra Pradesh chief minister Kiran Reddy, who resigned from the Congress last month, joined the BJP on Friday.

On Thursday, veteran Congress leader A.K. Antony’s son Anil K. Antony had joined the BJP in Kerala. The twin developments were seen as part of a concerted push by the saffron party to get a foothold in the southern states. So far, they have not been successful in the south except Karnataka.

Reddy, 62, was the last chief minister of undivided Andhra Pradesh and resigned from the Congress last month over differences with the party leadership. He had quit the Congress once before in 2014, protesting against the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh by the then UPA government, and floated his own party. However, he failed to make a mark and returned to the Congress in 2018.

Although Reddy is seen as a spent force now, the BJP welcomed him to build the perception of the saffron party being on the upswing.

Andhra Pradesh goes to the polls along with the Lok Sabha polls next year and the BJP hopes the old-timer would help the party get some traction in the state.

Parliamentary affairs minister Pralhad Joshi, who hails from Karnataka, was deputed to welcome the former Congress leader at the BJP headquarters. “I had never imagined I would leave the Congress,” Reddy said, recalling his family’s six-decade-long association with the party.

He hailed Prime Minister Narendra Modi and slammed the Congress, saying the party’s current leadership was unable to accept the people’s verdict and make course corrections. “They (Congress leadership) are correct and all others, including the people of India, are wrong,” he said.

BJP leaders claimed Reddy commands influence in the coastal Rayalaseema region of Andhra. In the ruling YSR Congress vs TDP-dominated politics of Andhra, the BJP is trying to emerge as a third pole in the state. In neighbouring Telangana too, the BJP has been trying to poach Congress leaders.

Inductions of the Congress leaders are also being done in view of the Karnataka elections around the corner where the party is battling simmering anti-incumbency. The BJP leaders said the joining of the Congress leaders would help in generating a positive perception among the voters of Karnataka.

“Apart from the south, the joining of the Congress leaders also helps in bolstering the impression across the country that the Congress is sliding down and the BJP going up and up,” one party leader said, stressing the narrative was required to win handsomely in 2024.