Triangular contests in the offing in Telangana as BRS fights for its survival
The Hindu
A resurgent Congress; the regional Bharat Rashtra Samiti; and the Bharatiya Janata Party together, they sum up the mood in Telangana ahead of polling for 17 Lok Sabha seats on May 13
A resurgent Congress, determined to repeat its November 2023 Assembly election victory; the regional Bharat Rashtra Samiti (BRS), which has recently suffered a series of setbacks and is fighting to revive its fortunes; and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which is working to improve its tally in the State to contribute to its nationwide goal of 400 seats — together, they sum up the mood in Telangana ahead of polling for 17 Lok Sabha seats on May 13.
The ruling Congress in the State is striving to keep its momentum, banking on the six guarantees from its Assembly poll manifesto, of which four have now been fulfilled. It is also roping in leaders of other parties to improve its chances while taking the BRS and the BJP head on. Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy is leading the Congress campaign, assisted by Deputy Chief Minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka and his Cabinet colleagues N. Uttam Kumar Reddy, D. Sridhar Babu, Ponnam Prabahakar, and Komatireddy Venkat Reddy. National leaders Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra are also planning rallies in the State.
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Former CM and BRS chief K. Chandrashekhar Rao has embarked on a bus yatra covering all the 17 constituencies, though the Election Commission of India slapped a two-day suspension on his campaign for the offensive language he used against the rivals. BRS working president K.T. Rama Rao and former Minister T. Harish Rao are the other leaders campaigning for their party’s candidates.
Hoping to ride on the image of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the slogan ‘Ab ki baar, 400 paar’, the BJP’s national leaders are extensively touring Telangana’s rural areas to improve the party’s prospects. The Prime Minister and Union Home Minister Amit Shah have addressed more than half a dozen meetings, their speeches filled with polarising rhetoric.
The State of Telangana was officially formed in June 2014, days after the general election. The BRS (then known as the TRS) was the clear front-runner in that 2014 election, bagging 11 of the State’s 17 seats, followed by two for the Congress, and one each for the Telugu Desam Party, the BJP, the All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM), and the YSR Congress Party.
Five years later, however, the BRS could not reach the double digit mark, winning only nine seats despite having made a clean sweep in the Assembly elections held a few months earlier in December 2018. That 2019 general election also saw the BJP emerging as a force to reckon with in Telangana, bagging four seats – Adilabad, Nizamabad, Karimnagar and Secunderabad — and providing a foothold for the party to expand its base in a State where it hitherto had a marginal presence. The Congress, licking its wounds from the drubbing it had received in the Assembly election had managed to win three Lok Sabha seats, while the AIMIM retained its stronghold in Hyderabad.