Hyderabad: Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) president and Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao is sharpening his 'political strategies' in the run-up to the 2023 Assembly polls. He has been picking up one issue after the other since November last year and making the party's rank and file go to the people and ensure that the TRS sets the agenda and other parties follow suit.
Starting with the issues of paddy procurement, the Centre's farm laws to union budget, drafting new Constitution and now Prime Minister Narendra Modi's remarks on Telangana formation, Chandrashekar Rao is pushing Opposition parties into defensive mode. Party sources said Rao would come up with more such strategies to sustain political momentum and tempo in favour of the TRS till 2023 Assembly polls.
Normally, Opposition parties hit the streets to protest on any issue but Rao is devising strategies making the ruling TRS hit the streets on various issues and keeping Opposition parties in a dilemma over what issue they need to take up to counter the TRS.
While the TRS called for protest rallies across the state on Wednesday against the Prime Minister’s remarks on Telangana formation, Opposition Congress, Left parties and other outfits such as Prof Kodandaram's TJS were forced to hit the roads and undertake agitation programmes on their own on the same issue while BJP leaders were forced to maintain silence on this issue.
Rao's next focus areas to target the BJP and hold agitation programmes are Singareni Collieries, power reforms, subsidy cut on fertilises, enhanced reservations for Muslims and STs. The TRS wants to take up these issues aggressively to the public stating that the BJP wants to privatise Singareni, stop free power supply to farmers, increase prices of fertilisers and deliberately delaying approval to enhanced quota for Muslims and STs despite TS Legislative Assembly passing the Act in April 2017.
In his first term in office from 2014 June to 2018 December and the second term from 2018 December till Dubbak Assembly bypoll in November 2020, Rao’s political strategy revolved around weakening the prime Opposition Congress. He could successfully weaken the Congress by taking its MLAs and MLCs into TRS fold thereby stripping Congress of 'prime Opposition party' status in both Legislative Assembly and Council.
However, the emergence of the BJP as a strong political force in Telangana from 2019 Lok Sabha polls in which BJP sprang a surprise by winning four Lok Sabha seats, made Rao rework his political strategy. The TRS felt the heat of BJP again in Dubbak Assembly bypoll and GHMC polls in 2020-end, where BJP registered decent victories and vote share.
But the flashpoint was BJP's stunning victory in Huzurabad Assembly bypoll in November 2021, which Chandrashekar Rao fought like a 'do-or-die battle' and made him realise that he had to take BJP more seriously than the Congress if he wanted to achieve hat-trick by retaining power for third term in 2023 Assembly polls.
When the BJP was attracting all political limelight with Huzurabad victory on November 2, Rao raked up the paddy procurement issue within two days and targetted the BJP government at the Centre. He called for protests across the state on November 12 and himself sat on dharna at Indira Park on November 18, for the first time in his capacity as the Chief Minister, demanding the Centre to procure paddy from Telangana in rabi. This forced the Congress and the BJP to take up the paddy issue thus diverting attention from the BJP's victory in Huzurabad.
