Many TRS leaders ready to join BJP, says Etala

HYDERABAD: Several TRS MLAs and other leaders were in touch with the BJP and would join it, said Huzurabad MLA Etala Rajendar. Those who had reached out did not want to face bypolls and had requested to keep the matter a secret for now as they would rather serve out their current terms, he said.

Rajendar, convener of the committee overseeing joining of leaders from other parties into the BJP, told Deccan Chronicle that a few thousand former sarpanches, MPTCs, and ZPTCs were waiting to join the BJP, as well as a few hundreds from other parties currently holding such posts.

“We also have three former ministers, and several former MLAs, as well as leaders from Congress ready to join the BJP,” he said.

Slamming the TRS for launching a vicious made-up campaign about Komatireddy Rajgopal Reddy entering into a quid pro quo deal with the BJP, Rajendar said, “They are deliberately doing it. They got a third-class report prepared and are trying to demoralise Rajgopal Reddy’s followers and our party workers. But we have a way to counter this, and we will do this by exposing their misdeeds.”

He said the BJP’s central leadership had decided that it would contribute to the strategy, planning and support the state BJP in winning the Munugode bypoll. “The party, from ground level, is united, and has a clear goal, that of winning Munugode, and later ending the TRS rule in the state,” he added.

To ensure that the BJP did not bleed as it did in Huzurabad with some of its  ground level leaders joining the TRS, Rajendar said one of the strategies in Munugode would be to ensure no non-TRS elected representative, whether from the district, mandal, or village level, was coerced into joining the ruling party.

Rajender said the TRS forced such ground level leaders in Huzurabad to join it with threats of stopping funds and so on. “But in Munugode, we will not let that happen. In the past, the intelligence wing was used to scare elected representatives. This time we will have the Election Commission special officers in place to ensure this does not happen again,” he said.