Will Telangana voters help KCR realise his national ambitions?
HYDERABAD: The D-day has arrived. The feverish campaigning by the TRS, Congress and BJP for the 17 Lok Sabha seats having come to an end on Tuesday, it is now the turn of the 2.97 crore voters to decide their fate on Thursday, when polling would be held across the State. The TRS, still heady with its resounding victory in the last December Assembly elections, is hopeful of doing an encore in the Lok Sabha polls. The Congress, which was battered out of shape in the Assembly polls, is determined to give the TRS a run for its money in at least six Lok Sabha constituencies, to prove its existence on Telangana soil.
Of the 17 Lok Sabha seats, Nizamabad, where Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao’s daughter K Kavitha is seeking re-election, is drawing national attention with turmeric and red jowar farmers, angry with the raw deal meted out to them, filing nominations en masse, taking the total number of contestants in the fray to a record 185.
For the TRS, the Lok Sabha elections are very important as they are expected to catapult KCR into the Delhi orbit to play a major role in crafting a coalition of bantam regional political parties, which are both anti-BJP and anti-Congress, to dislodge the NDA from power and stop the Congress in its tracks from staking a claim for the Delhi throne. The chief minister has been working overtime in preparing an agenda for the anti-BJP and anti-Congress federal front, which seeks to transfer most of the subjects in the Central list to the State’s, in true spirit of co-operative federalism.
Six crucial segments
As cornering a maximum number of seats from Telangana is a sine qua non for the chief minister to set his eyes beyond the Vindhyas, the TRS is not leaving anything to chance in going for them, though it may not be easy in at least six constituencies — Nalgonda, Bhongir, Chevella, Secunderabad, Malkajgiri and Khammam. In Khammam and Bhongir, the Congress candidates are seasoned politicians. In Khammam, former Union Minister Renuka Chowdhury is in the fray, while in Bhongir, former State minister Komatireddy Venkat Reddy is testing his luck. They are locking horns with industrialist Nama Nageswara Rao (Khammam) and sitting MP Boora Narsaiah Goud.
In Nalgonda, the Congress is fielding TPCC president N Uttam Kumar Reddy himself against TRS’ Vemreddy Narasimha Reddy, a businessman. In Chevella, G Ranjith Reddy is facing K Viswesara Reddy, who, on the eve of the last Assembly elections, left the TRS for the Congress. For TRS, winning Chevella is more important than any other seat, since it wants to settle scores with him for switching loyalty after winning Cehvella in 2014 on a TRS ticket.
KCR’s mojo and moxie
In Secunderabad, the TRS has fielded minister T Srinivasa Yadav’s son T Sai Kiran, while the BJP is trying to retain the seat though it replaced sitting MP B Dattatreya with G Kishan Reddy. The Congress, meanwhile, has positioned former MP Anjan Kumar Yadav. In Malkajgiri, the TRS is keen on inflicting another humiliating defeat on Congress working president A Revanth Reddy, whose personal allegations against KCR and his family rankle them all the time. BJP’s N Ramachadra Rao is trying his luck in the constituency where he might emerge as a serious contender. That Hyderabad will go to AIMIM is a foregone conclusion.
Another important seat which is attracting attention is Mahbubnagar, where former minister DK Aruna, after donning saffron robes, is in the ring to take on Congress nominee Challa Vamshi Chand Reddy and TRS nominee Manne Srinivas Reddy, a businessman.
The campaigning remained bitter, with the TRS and the Congress heaping allegations on each other and Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah making forays into Telangana to shore up the prospects of the BJP candidates. Though Congress chief Rahul Gandhi visited twice, the party continues to struggle, unable to match the mojo and moxie of KCR. It remains to be seen to what extent the voters would help KCR realise his national ambitions.