Small, but eager to make a big impact

Amid big names, many unheard of parties have sprung up this time claiming to give a tough fight to their well-known counterparts

Maa Telangana Party, BC Bharatha Desam Party, Bahujan Mukti Party, AP Rashtra Samaikya Samithi Party, Navatharam Party, Welfare Party of India and Praja Satta Party. Do these names ring a bell?

As the big parties battle, these small players also spring into the hustle and bustle of electoral politics from out of nowhere. The small political parties too want to have a share of the poll pie like their bigger counterparts. K. Veera Reddy, president of Maa Telangana Party (MTP), is a ‘mulki’ in Hyderabad and owns a function hall. His sole objective is to contest against TRS chief K. Chandrasekhar Rao from wherever the latter enters the fray.

For starters, Mr. Reddy floated MTP in 2009.

Promises to electorate

“KCR has gone back on his promise of making a Dalit as Chief Minister and a Muslim as deputy Chief Minister and instead has pitched himself as the CM candidate. I cannot digest this,” Mr. Reddy snaps.

Ask him what else he wants to promise for his electorate, he says: “My vote is for providing 50 per cent reservation for women in the Assembly and Parliamentary constituencies. If this is enabled, there is a fair chance of development back on the right track.”

Shock treatment to KCR

If Mr. Reddy nurses the ambition of handing out a shock treatment (defeat) to the TRS supremo, Peddiboyina Satyanarayana Yadav wants sitting MP Anjan Kumar Yadav out of Secunderabad LS poll fray. Founder of BC Bharatha Desam Party in 2010, Mr. Yadav wants to test the poll waters from Secunderabad. “I do not want the BC votes to be split and that’s why the present MP should sit out,” he says.

A former railway contractor, Mr. Yadav’s main agenda is development of his community, free education for people regardless of rich and poor and primary health. Though he hails from Peruru village in Mandavalli mandal of Krishna district, Mr. Yadav says his heart is in Secunderabad.

Not really in the mould of Mr. Yadav and Mr. Veera Reddy, D. Bhanumurthy, founder-president of Praja Satta Party, however, has set his eyes on providing “quality” politics. A quality management system lead auditor with 25 years of experience, Mr. Murthy says his party stands for quality-based politics. “My aim is to reinstall the faith of people in the political system and to strengthen and empower people,” he says.

Suffice it to say that most of them have utopian dreams!