HYDERABAD: Ahead of Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao’s public meeting in Gadwal on Monday, BRS sources said that his back-to-back public meetings since June 4 have boosted the party’s poll chances and buoyed the spirit of leaders and cadres.
They cited the success of Rao’s public meetings in Nirmal, Nagarkurnool and Mancherial, all of which logged massive public attendance. They said that the Chief Minister’s aggressive riposte to Opposition promises, to dump the Dharani portal into the Bay of Bengal had elicited a huge public response favourable to the party.
Further, there was an increasing demand from party leaders and cadre from other districts for organising public meetings by the Chief Minister in the run-up to the Assembly polls.
By delivering fiery speeches, the Chief Minister is attempting to negate the Opposition parties’ momentum with a ‘dual strategy’ of announcing new sops, highlighting the welfare schemes and development programmes implemented by BRS government in the past nine years and at the same time, targeting Congress and BJP for their alleged failures in implementing at least one welfare scheme or development programme that matches or surpasses Telangana in the states ruled by them.
Rao has made the Dharani portal a major poll plank, with Opposition parties targeting BRS and accusing it of causing severe hardships to farmers and landowners.
Rao’s strong pitch in favour of Dharani at public meetings — convincing people that their land will be safe only under the poral and that if it is scrapped, their land will be grabbed — resonated among the public.
BRS circles feel that the negativity surrounding the Dharani portal was minimised due to Chandrashekar Rao's forceful counter-offensive.
