SNCN ACHARYULU
Hyderabad
The forthcoming Assembly elections in Telangana are crucial for the Congress. The Assembly elections will decide whether the Congress will come to power or not in the near future.
In the last two Assembly elections, the Congress failed not only in coming to power but also in protecting its main opposition party status in the 119-Member Assembly. After its two continuous defeats in Assembly elections, the forthcoming Assembly elections have become crucial for the Congress.
This time the Congress leadership is very confident about coming to power in Telangana and the political atmosphere is also turning in its favour. The victory of the Congress in Karnataka has boosted its morale in Telangana.
In the last 10 years, many Congress leaders have left the party and nobody has joined it.
The Karnataka Assembly election changed the fortunes of the Congress in Telangana. Congress MLA Dasari Anasuya (Seethakka) said that at present there are only inductions into the Congress and no defections.
A party has to win at least 12 seats (10% of the total) to get the main opposition tag in the Telangana Assembly.
In the 2014 Assembly elections, the Congress won 21 seats and in the 2018 Assembly elections, it won 19 seats. Even though the Congress won more seats than the required number to get recognised as the main opposition it failed to protect it on both occasions as it faced large scale defections.
The fresh inductions of senior politicians into the party have increased the hopes of the Congress of coming to power. But the Congress should not underestimate BRS supremo Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao. He will not let go of even a whiff of a chance to continue in power.
After the large-scale defections of its MLAs, it has now become a big challenge for the Congress to win power and to retain it for five long years. Unless the Congress gets an absolute majority it may be difficult to retain power for five years and it can face danger from the BRS at any time.
The BRS is confident of gaining power a third time by engineering defections from the Congress if it falls short of seats. A senior politician said that it is not easy for the Congress to defeat the BRS, particularly if the BRS crosses 40 seats, as it will do everything necessary to grab power.
