While KCR is trying to form an anti-BJP, anti-Congress front, the saffron party is busy cornering the TRS in Telangana.
New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) state unit in Telangana is trying hard to make deep inroads in Telangana and has intensified its campaign against the state government led by K.Chandrashekar Rao of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS).
The recent action by the state police against the state BJP president Bandi Sanjay Kumar has led to unity among the party cadres who are now trying to corner the state government on every issue. Kumar was arrested and sent to 14 days’ judicial custody for allegedly violating the Covid guidelines imposed in Telangana and organizing protesters against the state government.
The BJP central leadership also took the issue seriously and the party’s national president J.P. Nadda issued a press statement condemning the “inhuman” assault and arrest of Telangana’s BJP chief as “death of democracy”.
Hyderabad-based political commentator M.S. Lakshminarayana said, “Since the last few months, it is clear that the BJP is in no mood to go easy on the TRS which is trying to corner the Modi government at the center. In 2019, the BJP was not focusing much on Telangana but if you look at the party’s activities since the last one year it is clear that the party is very active in the state. The success in the recent Huzurabad assembly bypoll had energized the cadre.
The party had appointed office bearers in all the 119 assembly segments and 17 parliamentary seats. In the coming months you will see the BJP putting a lot of effort in the state. The Indian National Congress (INC) is also working hard in the state.” In the Huzurabad Assembly bypoll, the BJP Etela Rajender won by a margin of roughly 24,000 votes.
Telangana will go for Assembly election in 2023 and parliamentary elections in 2024. In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP won four seats in Telangana, its highest ever in the state and got 19.45% vote share, while in the Assembly election, it got only seven percent votes.
Talking to The Sunday Guardian, senior state BJP leader G. Manohar Reddy said: “We won the Huzurabad Assembly seat in the bypoll, which had shocked the TRS government. You are seeing the changes made by the ruling party after the bypoll result. Our performance was good in the Greater Hyderabad municipal polls also. Our central leadership is also focusing on the state. Many top leaders and chief ministers of BJP-ruled states are touring Telangana in the last few months. We are confident that in the coming Assembly elections, our performance will be very good and our party will form the government. As the state government is targeting our party, our popularity is increasing day by day.” Telangana’s political landscape is getting interesting as the parties are going all-out to attack each other. Telangana Rashtra Samithi president K. Chandrasekhar Rao is also pushing for a national level anti-BJP and anti-Congress third front which is getting support of the two main Left parties in the country, the CPI and CPM, and few other regional parties but observers feel that KCR own stability is in question since both the BJP and the INC is active cornering him. The TRS president had held meetings with CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury, CPI general secretary D Raja and Bihar’s leader of opposition and RJD leader Tejashwi Prasad Yadav at Pragathi Bhavan for the third front.
In the 2018 Assembly elections, the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) won 88 Assembly seats, while the Indian National Congress (INC) won 19 seats and All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) had won seven seats. The BJP had won only one seat, but its vote share was the third highest in the state.