Riding on a slew of welfare schemes, mega irrigation projects and the charismatic leadership of Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR), the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) retained power by securing a landslide victory in the election to the Assembly held on December 7.
The Congress-led rainbow alliance, called Praja Kutami (People’s Front) that includes the Telugu Desam Party (TDP), the Telangana Jana Samithi (TJS) and the Communist Party of India (CPI), came a cropper. While the TRS won in 88 of the 119 constituencies, the Congress secured 19 seats and the TDP emerged victorious in just two constituencies. The TJS and the CPI drew a blank.
The results indicated that schemes like Rythu Bandhu, Rythu Bhima, Kalyana Lakshmi, Shaadi Mubarak, old-age pensions and various caste-based welfare measures, introduced by the TRS government, were received well by the people and created a vote bank for the ruling party. The support extended by the All India Majlis-e-Ittahadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) to the TRS also seems to have helped the latter secure significant votes among the minorities.
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In 2014, the TRS won 63 seats, followed by the Congress (21), the TDP (15), the MIM (7), the BJP (5), the YSRCP (3), the BSP (2) and others four.
Weak alliance partners, joining hands with the TDP, absence of a popular leader and an enormous delay in the finalisation of the list of candidates seemed to have affected the Congress’s prospects in the first Assembly election held after the formation of the State.
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Congress leaders, in private, admitted that the TRS chief had succesfully campaigned to show Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu as an “enemy” of the State.
The campaign centred around Mr. Naidu’s ‘backdoor’ entry into the State which is said to have sent negative signals for the People’s Front.
Despite hectic campaigning by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP president Amit Shah and Union Ministers Rajnath Singh, Smriti Irani, JP Nadda apart from UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and others, the BJP won only one seat in the current elections, four fewer than what it had won in 2014.
A jubilant Mr. Rao declared that it was the “victory of the Telangana people.”
“Farmers, women, Dalits, Girijans and various sections of the people all have given this victory to us,” he said at a press conference.
The TRS president has now set his eyes on national politics. “We are going to play a crucial role in national politics. There is a 100% need for a non-Congress, non-BJP government at the Centre. Today Telangana showed the way in this regard,” Mr. Rao said.
Informing that he would visit Delhi shortly, he said, “Very soon a new national party with a consortium of various regional parties may come.”
Reacting to the trends, TPCC chief N. Uttam Kumar Reddy said: “Going by the distorted trends, there is a strong suspicion that EVM machines have been manipulated. We demand that 100% counting of VVPAT paper trails be taken up in all constituencies.