K Chandrasekhar Rao backed BJP to show his clout

Hyderabad: Telangana Rashtra Samiti president and Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao is said to have supported the RTI Amendment Bill in the Rajya Sabha to send a clear message to the BJP state leadership that he maintains his clout with their high command in Delhi.

Against the backdrop of the BJP state leadership targeting the TRS after the Lok Sabha polls, the last-minute move of the TRS to support the Bill and help its passage in the Rajya Sabha on July 25 came as a surprise to BJP and TRS leaders who were not in the loop.

The Congress has been alleging that the TRS and opposition BJP have a clandestine understanding to cooperate on various issues.

Mr Rao, during his first term as Chief Minister, announced that the TRS would extend issue-based support to the BJP government at the Centre and went on to support it on various issues, including election of the President and the Vice-President, GST and demonetisation.

With the political scenario changing after the recent Lok Sabha elections, it appeared that the TRS will maintain a distance from the BJP as the its state leadership was targeting the party to emerge as the main opposition in the state.

Mr Rao, however, annou-nced that the party’s wou-ld continue to give issue-based support to the Centre and supported Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘One Nation, One Election’ plan. Despite this, the BJP state leadership is critical of the TRS’s ties with the MIM.

Therefore, Mr Rao taking a U-turn on the party’s stand to oppose the Bill initially and changing his mind after receiving a call from BJP president and home minister Amit Shah surprised political circles.

Interestingly, TRS parliamentary party leader K. Kesava Rao admitted to the last minute change of the party stand on the RTI Amendment Bill while talking with mediapersons at Delhi.

Though the party had earlier decided to demand that the Bill be referred to a select committee, it has decided to support it following instructions from the TRS top leadership, Dr Rao added.

TRS leaders are of the opinion that by supporting the Bill, Mr Rao wanted to give a clear message to the BJP state leadership that the TRS would not fall into their trap, which is planning to polarise the majority vote bank by driving away the TRS from the MIM.

They said Mr Rao was aware of the BJP’s plan to divide the TRS-MIM relationship and then split the majority votes. They admitted in private conversations that after noticing the BJP’s plans, Mr Rao cautioned them not to fall into the trap of the BJP leaders. He assured them that the TRS would send a signal to the state leaders of the BJP about his clout with the top bosses in Delhi.

Referring to the party’s stand on the triple talaq Bill, TRS leaders said that it will stick to its earlier stand of abstaining from the debate in the Rajya Sabha.

They felt that by supporting the BJP in passing the RTI Amendment Bill in the Rajya Sabha but abstaining from the triple talaq Bill, the party boss would send a clear message that the TRS would maintain equal relations with the BJP and the MIM in future too.