Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee president N. Uttam Kumar Reddy on Friday said that the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi had manipulated the municipal poll process, and used police force to intimidate Congress contestants to withdraw candidatures — the reasons behind the party not fielding candidates in all seats.
Terming the process by the State Election Commission as “erratic and illogical”, he blamed lack of sufficient time interval between the dates of notification and nominations for Opposition parties being unable to field strong candidates in all the wards, while it was to the advantage of the TRS as it knew ward reservations in advance, he said.
“It is not for Congress’ weakness that we could not field candidates in at least 500 seats, but because of TRS manipulation,” he said, condemning TRS working president K.T. Rama Rao’s statements on the subject.
Addressing various poll meetings in Huzurnagar on Friday, the senior Congress leader and Nalgonda MP also alleged that TRS leaders with the police help, either lured or intimidated its contestants in various places to withdraw candidatures.
“TRS does not contest, but manages polls. It did not deliver fully even 10 promises of the 500 major promises it made since 2014. It remained a copycat of Congress policies and schemes,” he said.
The many irrigation projects, the Hyderabad airport, Outer Ring Road, the Metro Rail, all major infrastructure, which are now painted pink, including schemes such as the GHMC ₹ 5 meal scheme, have originally been launched by the Congress, he said.
Mr. Uttam Kumar Reddy reiterated that the government is yet to roll out the promised unemployment allowance scheme, among other promises and schemes, and said the municipal poll results would be a shocker to TRS.
