Refuting the allegation that he is joining the BJP only to win the Mahbubnagar Lok Sabha seat, Telangana Nagara Samiti president Nagam Janardhan Reddy has claimed that he is a mass leader and does not need any party’s tag or support to win elections.
Speaking at a meet-the-press organised by the Telangana Journalists Forum here on Sunday, the Telangana leader said, “I have been winning elections for 30 years on my own and even today I don’t need any party’s support to win an election. All such talk is baseless and politically motivated. I am joining the BJP because I feel that it is the only party which can deliver Telangana.”
After resigning from the TDP, I contested a byelection on my own and won it, he recalled. “TRS chief K Chandrasehkar Rao had offered me the post of working president of his party but I rejected it on the ground that the TRS was planning to support corrupt Congress at the Centre. If I were a weak leader, why would the TRS offer to make me its working president?” he shot back.
Telangana statehood could be possible only through a national party and since the Congress-led UPA government let down the people of the region many times in the past, the only hope and option now was the BJP, he explained.
The BJP had been voicing the demand for a separate Telangana state since its Kakinada conclave in 1997 and much before the TRS was formed, he said.
“With its past record and the scams surfaced during its term the chances of the Congress-led UPA coming to power again at the Centre are very thin. According to surveys, its tally is likely to fall below 100 in the next general election.
Even Rahul Gandhi’s charisma will not help the Congress regain power. On the other hand, the BJP-led NDA has better chances of forming the next government and it is wiser for me to join the BJP which is the only party that can deliver Telangana.”