Hyderabad: All eyes are on TRS president and Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao's meeting his Maharashtra counterpart and Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray in Mumbai on Sunday. He is also expected to meet Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar in the evening.
This is Rao’s first visit to any state after he had announced on Sunday last that he would try to bring regional parties together against the BJP before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
TRS sources said this would be a 'luncheon meeting' at Thackeray’s official residence Varsha. There was no clarity on whether or not Sharad Pawar and the Congress leaders would be part of this meeting.
He is likely to visit Pawar at 4 pm at his residence in Mumbai after meeting Thackeray, and discuss national politics. Rao and his delegation would leave by a special flight from Begumpet airport at 11 am and return in the night, sources said.
Finance minister T. Harish Rao is likely to accompany Rao to Mumbai, as also legislative affairs minister Vemula Prashanth Reddy, TRS Parliamentary Party leader K. Keshava Rao, TS Planning Board vice-chairman B. Vinod Kumar, Rajya Sabha member J. Santosh Kumar, Rythu Bandhu Samiti chairman Palla Rajeshwar Reddy.
The Shiv Sena heads the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) coalition government consisting of the NCP and the Congress and if leaders from the two parties attend the meeting, it may throw up new political equations at the state and national levels.
Party sources said Rao has remained totally focused for the last three days on the issues that need to be discussed in Sunday's meeting with Thackeray, and for that reason could not make it to the Medaram Jatara on Friday and also Kalyana Mahotsavams in all 108 Divya Desams at Chinna Jeeyar Swamy ashram at Muchintal on Saturday.
Chandrashekar Rao is learnt to have decided to take up the issue of BJP's 'communal and disruptive politics' in the meeting apart from the Centre 'discriminating' against states that are opposing the BJP and attempting to destabilise or topple such state governments.
The CM has also been accusing the BJP of misusing power and the government machinery by letting loose various Central investigating agencies like CBI, ED and I-T against top leaders and family members of regional parties and all these issues will be discussed in the meeting, it is learnt.
Although Rao launched a political war against the BJP-led government at the Centre over paddy procurement issue soon after the Huzurabad Assembly bypoll debacle in the first week of November last, he started making attempts to unite regional parties against the BJP with his meetings with Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin on December 14 and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tejashwi Yadav on January 11.
Rao further intensified his attack on the BJP after the presentation of the Union Budget on February 1 and for the first time he announced his plans of playing a key role in national politics on February 13 by meeting Chief Ministers and chiefs of regional parties.
