: Minister for Irrigation T. Harish Rao has said that both Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress have lost the Medak Lok Sabha by-election even before the polling by fielding candidates, who were rejected by the electorate barely three months back.
He sought to know how the candidates who failed to win the confidence of people in Assembly constituencies can win a Parliamentary election comprising seven Assembly segments. Speaking at a meeting at which State Kurma Sangham president Y. Mallesham joined Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) here on Thursday, Mr. Rao said vote to BJP would strengthen the Seemandhra leadership while vote to the Congress would be useless.
Stating that several leaders stopped short of joining TRS in the past as Seemandhra media had tried to portray party president K. Chandrasekhar Rao a villain, Mr. Harish Rao said they had realised their mistake now and were strengthening TRS. Convinced by the vision and plans of the Chief Minister to reconstruct Telangana such leaders were joining TRS, he noted.
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He remarked that Telugu Desam Party (TDP) president N. Chandrababu Naidu and Jana Sena Party (JSP) founder Pawan Kalyan were shying away from campaigning for T. Jayaprakash Reddy, the BJP candidate in Medak, fearing that their visit would deny him even the prospective votes. He sought to know from the BJP whether people should support it for transferring seven Khammam mandals to Andhra Pradesh, keeping quiet on PPAs cancellation by AP, giving powers to the Governor on law and order in Hyderabad or allowing AP get power generated at Lower Sileru.
Simlarly, Mr. Harish Rao asked the Congress candidate V. Sunitha Laxma Reddy whether people should support her for her silence on then AP Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy’s open threat not to allow even trickling of funds to Telangana.