Telangana Congress president A. Revanth Reddy said Chief Minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao was in favour of the ‘One Nation One Election’ concept and his silence even after the Centre made its intentions clear is an indication of his continuous support to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
At a press conference in Hyderabad on September 3, Mr. Reddy also released a letter submitted by the Chief Minister revealing that the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (now BRS) was in favour of simultaneous elections to the Parliament. The letter was in response to the letter sent by the then Law Commission of India Chairman, Justice B.S. Chauhan.
In that letter, Mr. KCR said the TRS was strongly in favour of holding simultaneous elections to Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies and that he was deputing then TRS Parliament member B. Vinod Kumar to an interaction called by the Law Commission.
Mr. Reddy claimed that Mr. KCR’s silence even after the news broke out was an indication of the BRS-BJP’s friendship. He said Mr. KCR supported all the controversial bills and decisions of the BJP in the last 9 years and he would completely support the One Nation One Election bill as well. “Let Mr. KCR come out and make his stand clear,” he demanded.
Presidential governance
The Congress chief alleged that the simultaneous elections were the first step to change India’s governance from a Prime Minister form of governance to a Presidential form of governance where only Mr. Modi could take all the decisions. The Constituent Assembly that debated before the Constitution was finalised had opposed the Presidential form of governance as it saw power going into one man’s hands was not desirable for the country, he said.
So any move by Mr. Modi towards simultaneous elections was Unconstitutional and dangerous for democracy. The rights of the States would be snatched away completely and the very existence of Southern states would be in question, he argued. “It was unfortunate that Mr. KCR was supporting such a move where the future of Telangana was at stake,” he alleged.
Mr. Revanth Reddy claimed that recent surveys have proved beyond doubt that Congress was coming back to power in Telangana, Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh and Rajasthan and that has worried Mr. Modi who was trying to create a new narrative but people are smart enough. The C Voter survey gave 38% of votes to Congress and 31% to the BRS and the CM was wary of his rapidly declining popularity and decided to side with Mr. Modi.
The Congress chief also indicted that one nation one election would throw up Constitutional crisis. If a state gets a hung Assembly would it have to wait for five years for the next election and continued to be ruled by the President, he asked. Similar situation can come up for Parliament as well with a fractures mandate. What would be the fate of the country then and who would govern it, he wondered.
‘Kovind dragged into politics by Modi’
Mr. Reddy also accused Mr. Modi of demeaning the presidential office by appointing former President, Ramnath Kovind to lead the High-Level Committee for analysing the feasibility of ‘One Nation, one Election’. All the previous Presidents of India led a respectable life without getting involved in politics but Mr. Modi has now dragged even the previous President into politics.
