Congress ridicules KCR’s ‘save democracy’ remarks

HYDERABAD: Congress leaders fumed at Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao for his appeal to “save democracy” from the “destabilising governments in different states,” while he had encouraged Opposition MLAs to switch parties.

Rao had encouraged defections despite the TRS government enjoying a comfortable majority in the 2014 and 2018 Assembly elections. They said that Rao and Prime Minister Narendra Modi had adopted similar tactics to wipe out the Opposition.

Speaking to Deccan Chronicle, former PCC president Ponnala Laxmaiah said that Chandrashekar Rao had admitted 43 MPs, MLAs and MLCs into the TRS fold in the last eight years. “The High Court found fault with him 65 times on various issues as he had never respected the judiciary and now appeals to the judiciary to protect the democracy”, he said.

Chandrashekar Rao is equally responsible for the misdeeds of Modi for having supported all bills in Parliament, he said. It is not ‘Desh bachavo' but ‘save Telangana from Rao’s clutches’ that was needed, he said.

Former Rajya Sabha member V. Hanumantha Rao wanted to know why when the MLAs poaching incident was being probed, the Chief Minister politicised it. “Why did he not respond when BJP dethroned Congress governments in different states”, he quipped.

TPCC senior vice-president G. Niranjan said that the Chief Minister and Modi were trying to eliminate opposition parties at the state and national levels. The hue and cry over poaching of MLAs was part of the drama, he said.

TRS leaders created problems for Palley Ravikumar, when he accompanied the Congress candidate at the time of filing of nomination papers. When Boora Narsaiah Goud accompanied the TRS candidate, he was subject to a similar treatment by the BJP leaders, he said.