Having decisively parted ways with the Congress and United Progressive Alliance (UPA), the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) president K. Chandrasekhar Rao on Saturday showed his inclination to tie up with the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance in his attempts to secure Statehood for Telangana.
“We trusted the UPA to keep its promise on separate Telangana but it deceived us. Thus, we have to look for an alternative and the NDA says it will concede the demand in three months (of coming to power),” Mr. Rao was quoted as stating at the steering committee meeting of the Telangana Joint Action Committee (JAC) presided by M. Kodandaram.
Without naming TRS, sources said Mr. Rao emphasised on giving impetus to the parties which stood a chance of winning maximum seats in Telangana to achieve the demand. That will also give ammunition to the JAC, he remarked.
“The TRS did not allow the functioning of the Assembly for the whole session last time with just 20 MLAs. Two of its MPs with the support of NDA also stalled Lok Sabha for four days. Imagine the situation when there are 100 MLAs and 15 MPs of the party,” he added.
Referring to the padayatra by Telugu Desam president N. Chandrababu Naidu and YSR Congress leader Sharmila in Telangana, Mr. Rao reportedly advised JAC to ignore them as they would earn political advantage if they were taken seriously. Mr. Rao called for a psychological and not physical warfare to get Statehood. The people were indifferent to elections. Mere struggles were not enough as political processes also weighed in securing the demand. “For that, we need seats”. He asked the JAC to guard against the danger of people not reacting to a parallel movement in support of integrated State like it happened during the Jai Andhra agitation in 1971.
