BRS picks Khammam as launch pad for national goal

The ruling BRS has chosen Khammam town, bordering Andhra Pradesh, to build a significant electoral presence in the neighbouring Telugu State, as part of its goal to emerge as a national political force.

Once considered a stronghold of Communists and later the Congress, Khammam is a sleepy town, about 200 km from the state capital. Today, it has become the political nerve centre with major political parties holding rallies.

The BRS, the then TRS, could win only a single Assembly seat (2018) out of 10 in united Khammam district. Later, as many as 6 Congress MLAs, and 2 TDP legislators switched over to BRS. Apparently, the ruling party is working towards building its base here, which would come in handy to take forward the work in neighbouring Andhra Pradesh.

On December 22, Telugu Desam Party supremo N Chandrababu Naidu held a public meeting here seeking a fillip to the party’s revival in the state.

YSRC party founder and Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy’s sister Y S Sharmila also announced that she would contest from Palair constituency in Khammam district during the next assembly polls.

The ruling BRS’s first public meeting at Khammam town today would see the participation of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, his Punjab counterpart Bhagwant Mann, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav and CPI’s D Raja.

The BRS leadership is pulling out all stops to ensure massive turnout at the public meeting to make it a landmark event.

According to political analysts Khammam, being the bordering district with Andhra Pradesh, public mobilisation from the neighbouring state would be easier.

Also, a chunk of the Khammam electorate are natives of Andhra Pradesh which could have prompted the Bharat Rashtra Samithi leadership to organize a meeting in the town, they said.

“In order to please Left parties, the new friends of BRS, KCR (Chief Minister K Chanrasekhar Rao ) might have zeroed on Khammam to hold the meeting. Also there are some differences in the district BRS party leadership. He must have taken that also into consideration to show the detractors the strength of the party,” Telakapalli Ravi, a senior journalist and political analyst said.

On the three chief ministers sharing dais with Rao in the meeting he said, as the BJP which is emerging as principal challenger to BRS in Telangana, Rao also needs a national image to match with some of the saffron parry leaders such as Amit Shah and JP Nadda.

He further said KCR was to some extent successful in bringing some of the key opposition leaders on the dais, though his immediate goal would be to sail through the Assembly polls in November or December this year.

Huge cut-outs and hoardings of KCR, Kejriwal, Bhagwant Mann, Pinarayi Vijayan, Akhilesh Yadav and D Raja dotted the district.

Khammam town was decorated with BRS’s pink flags as if the city was painted with the colour.