National hurdle for Telugu Desam
Party finds name, symbol will not work in other states
By : s.n.c.n. acharyulu
Update: 2015-05-20 06:16 GMT
Hyderabad: The Telugu Desam election symbol, and the party’s name itself, are being seen as hurdles to the TD’s plans of going national. Senior leaders are pondering over how to continue with the TD’s election symbol, the “Cycle”, if the party fields candidates in other states since there are other parties with the same symbol at the national level. To emerge as a national party, the TD has to contest in at least four states.
The talk in political circles is that it will not be possible for the Telugu Desam to keep the cycle as its election symbol in other states. At the national level, the Samajwadi Party’s symbol is also “Cycle” and the Election Commission will not give the same symbol to two political parties.
TD leaders, meanwhile, say that a change in the election symbol will lead to problems for the party since the “Cycle” is synonymous with the TD for people of the two Telugu-speaking states. Another major issue is the party’s name. Though there are Telugu speaking people living in states like Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and some others, it will be difficult for the party to win over non-Telugu speaking voters.
Telugu Desam founder-president, late N.T. Rama Rao, had contemplated changing the party’s name to ‘Bharata Desam’ to get a national tag. However, the opposition parties had objected to it, saying that criticising the name or raising slogans against it would end up criticising the nation.
Subsequently, NTR had dropped the proposal. Some TD leaders see changing the party’s name to ‘All India Telugu Desam Party’, on the lines of the AIADMK, as a way out. Meanwhile, the TD leadership has appointed a three-member committee, headed by AP finance minister and senior party leader Yanamala Ramakrishnudu, to study the steps and strategies required to make it a national party.
Speaking to this newspaper, Mr Ramakrishnudu said that the immediate hurdle for the party’s expansion plans was its name and election symbol. “We are consulting legal experts on the matter,” he said.