As the Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) troika looked on with apprehension at Telangana Chief Minister and Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) president K. Chandrasekhar Rao’s temple pageantry in Maharashtra, the BRS chief on June 27 questioned why the State’s political parties felt so threatened by his party.
As Mr. Rao visited the historic Vitthal-Rukmini and Tulja Bhavani temples in Pandharpur and Dharashiv respectively, the top brass of the MVA, which included the Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), the Congress and the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT), decried the BRS as the ‘B-team’ of the ruling BJP which was out to cannibalise their traditional vote bank.
Later, addressing a public meeting at Sarkoli near Pandharpur in Solapur district, Mr. Rao said: “Tell me one party in Maharashtra that has not been given a chance… the Congress ruled the State for a full 50 years. Then, the people have given a chance to the NCP, the Shiv Sena and the BJP. If they really wanted to work for the betterment of the people, any one of them could have done so.”
Dismissing the MVA’s accusations of the BRS being the BJP’s handmaiden in Maharashtra, the Telangana Chief Minister further said: “One thing I cannot understand is that we have been here [in Maharashtra] barely three or four months… Why are these parties so angry with us. Why is there so much fear, so much anger for such a small party like the BRS. No party has missed an opportunity to target us. The Congress calls us BJP’s ‘B team’, the BJP calls us the Congress’ ‘A team’… We are not anybody’s team. We are the team of farmers, women, Dalits, minorities, backward classes.”
“Farmers’ government”
Reiterating his party’s slogan of ab ki bar kisan sarkar, Mr. Rao said the BRS was the only party in the country which had the courage to openly claim that next time there would be a farmers’ government.
The BRS president said all political parties had been betraying the farming community since Independence and it was time for transformation by joining hands of farmers and farm workers, who comprise about 60% of the electorate.
“All these parties are now scared that farmers are attaching themselves to the BRS…the BRS is not just limited to Telangana or Maharashtra, but want to bring about a qualitative change in the country. Farmers could dictate the fortunes of parties if they stay united,” said the Telangana Chief Minister.
Detailing the schemes implemented for the benefit of farmers in Telangana, he questioned why the same could not be implemented in a wealthy State like Maharashtra.
NCP leader from Pandharpur, Bhagirath Bhalke, formally joined the BRS in Mr. Rao’s presence, remarking that he shifted from the NCP because Mr. Rao’s party was genuinely concerned with the welfare of farmers.
Mr. Bhalke, son of the late three-time NCP MLA Bharat Bhalke who had died of post-COVID complications in 2020, was narrowly defeated by the BJP’s Samadhan Autade in the Pandharpur by-poll in 2021.
In march this year, former MLA from Kannad (in Sambhajinagar district) Harshawardhan Jadhav had joined the BRS after meeting Mr. Rao in Hyderabad.
Mr. Rao, who has already held rallies in Marathwada and Vidarbha and plans to open shop in Aurangabad, Pune and Mumbai, has set alarm bells ringing for the MVA coalition in Maharashtra, particularly the Congress and the NCP.
Remarking that the situation created by Mr. Rao’s frequent and concentrated forays into the State was “worrisome”, senior Congressman and former Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan said the BRS chief’s moves would have to be watched carefully in the future.
‘BJP’s last resort’
“The use of the BRS to cut the MVA’s, especially the Congress’ votes, shows how desperate the BJP has become. They have thrown everything into the kitchen sink to break the Opposition unity in Maharashtra. When all those ploys failed, they are now using the BRS as a last resort,” Mr. Chavan told The Hindu.
He said the Congress’ resounding win in Karnataka had blocked hopes of the BRS’ southward expansion.
“Hence his forays into Maharashtra. It is a mystery how his billboards have sprung up in so many places across Maharashtra and from where the funding for his advertisements and party organisation in the State was coming from. It appears that an enormous war chest has been reserved for K. Chandrasekhar Rao,” said Mr. Chavan, hinting at the BJP’s use of the BRS to neutralise the MVA in the State.
Earlier, NCP leader Ajit Pawar, too had said that Mr. Rao’s forays in the State needed to be taken seriously as it could spell problems for the MVA.
Shiv Sena (UBT) spokesman and MP Sanjay Raut observed that Mr. Rao was not present at the June 23 Opposition meeting in Patna.
“Is the Congress the BRS’ enemy? The political situation in every State is different…In Telangana, Mr. Rao faces a challenge from the Congress and not the BJP. So, if he is trying pressure tactics [on the Congress] with his programmes here, it could pose serious problems,” he said.
Mr. Raut further said that what Mr. Rao gained in the elections in form of seats was beside the point as his aim appeared not to win but to create trouble for the MVA.
“It is clear that he is the BJP’s ‘B team’…he [Mr. Rao] is doing exactly what the AIMIM has been doing in Maharashtra, that is fragmenting votes to benefit the BJP,” Mr. Raut said.
‘Double standards’
Meanwhile, Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde hit back at the Thackeray faction’s “double standards” in dubbing the BRS as the BJP’s ‘B team’.
Mr. Shinde said that in February last year, the Telangana Chief Minister had met both Mr. Thackeray and Sharad Pawar with a view to forming a broad coalition against the BJP.
“So after having him over for lunch [in February 2022], the Thackeray faction is calling Mr. Rao the BJP’s ‘B team’. This smacks of double standards…we have nothing to do with who comes to Maharashtra, be it Mr. Rao or anybody else. Maharashtra’s public is smart. They are firmly behind that government which is working for development,” said Mr. Shinde
Senior political analyst Vivek Bhavsar pointed out that given Mr. Rao’s affinity with Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) chief Prakash Ambedkar (who is an ally of Uddhav Thackeray’s faction in the State), the MVA could face serious problems if the BRS, the VBA and Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM came together in the 2024 elections.
Mr. Bhavsar said that in the 2019 Lok Sabha election, the VBA-AIMIM alliance had queered the pitch for Congress and NCP candidates in at least 9-10 seats by eating into the latter parties’ votes.
(With inputs from Hyderabad bureau)
