The Congress party will trounce the ruling TRS in the next Assembly elections likely to be held in April 2023 and form the government in Telangana by bagging 90 Assembly seats to get the State rid of the “corruption-ridden” regime, said Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) president A. Revanth Reddy.
“The Congress party will not tolerate even the shadow of the corruption-ridden persons at the helm in Telangana, who earned notoriety for their acts of betrayal in 2004 and 2014 besides encouraging defections,” Mr. Reddy told a press conference here late on Monday afternoon.
He was responding to a specific query on the likely impact of the election strategist Prashant Kishor’s marathon consultations with Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao in the last two days amidst speculations over the political consultant’s reported proposal to join the Congress party on the political equations in the State.
The TPCC chief was in the town to participate in a preparatory meeting of the party cadres as a prelude to the Rythu Sangarshana Sabha slated to be addressed by the Congress top leader Rahul Gandhi in Warangal on May 6.
Mr. Reddy expressed dismay over the speculative reports in a section of media over Prashant Kishor’s meeting with K. Chandrasekhar Rao and the deal the TRS reportedly entered with the I-PAC, a political consultancy firm with which the election strategist was hitherto associated with.
An eight-member committee of senior Congress leaders constituted by the party high command to examine the proposal of Mr. Prashant Kishor to join the Congress has recommended that he should sever his political and business transactions with other political parties and devote his full time for the Congress party, Mr Reddy said, adding that he may have come to Hyderabad to comply with the pre-condition stipulated by the Congress high command to withdraw from his previous contracts.
He said: “The party high command has given clarity that the rank and file of the Congress party in the State should continue to strive to make the corruption-ridden TRS regime bite the dust at the next year’s Assembly polls.”
Both the TRS and the BJP are our common enemies in the State, he said, alleging that the BJP State president Bandi Sanjay is conducting padayatra in the old undivided Mahabubnagar district as per the TRS strategy to split the anti-establishment vote in south Telangana, the traditional bastion of the Congress.
The TRS leadership has realised that the Congress is bound to trounce it in the next Assembly polls and hence desperately trying to ensure division of anti-establishment votes in the next year’s polls.
He called upon all sections of people to voluntarily participate in the Rythu Sangarshana Sabha on May 6 to extend their solidarity to the cause of farmers’ and help articulate the voices of farmers against the “anti-farmer” policies of both the TRS government in the State and the BJP dispensation at the Centre.
Congress Legislature Party leader Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka, Manthani MLA D. Sridhar Babu, MLC T Jeevan Reddy, the party senior leaders, including former Karimnagar MP Ponnam Prabhakar and others, were present.
