PNS|Hyderabad
Internal bickerings among leaders of the BRS party are likely to affect the fortunes of the party in the ensuing Secunderabad Cantonment Board polls and even the Telangana Legislative Assembly elections.
With the demise of MLA G Sayanna, no one leader can drive the party to both polls. Three prominently heard names are Krishank Manne, Erolla Srinivas and Gajjala Nagesh who are known to be confidantes of K T Rama Rao, T Harish Rao and K Chandrashekar Rao respectively.
All three of them are chairpersons for different corporations. Sources said that the internal bickerings had affected the party’s chances in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections which are held by Congress now.
While these three prominent aspirants of the MLA tickets were hardly seen together, currently the party leaders are divided into at least two groups. A party leader said, “The problem is neither Sayanna nor Shankar Rao has made their presence strong. So there is a vacuum.
Currently, all the aspirants can win only with the face of the CM and party. Even for the Board, there are weak candidates in the majority of wards plus the MLA’s efforts individually in the last few years were not much. Now for Board elections, we are expecting a Minister to be assigned to navigate the party. We can win all 8 wards if the planning is meticulous, especially considering that 56,000-odd votes were removed from the constituency”.
Local leaders are expecting that Harish Rao or Talasani Srinivas Yadav will be made in-charge of the board elections.
While speculations are rife that the party has already picked whom they want to project, sources in the party said that “it is common to have aspirations, but ultimately, we know it is only CM KCR who can drive the party to win. The competition is between BRS and BJP in board elections and Congress is out of the picture despite the MP being TPCC”.
However, the impact of not conducting the funeral of Sayanna with state honours is giving rise to a rebellion. Party sources said, “The problem is one of our leaders said that it would be done with state honours as done in the recent demises. But no MLA who passed away in BRS was given state honours be it Nomula Narsimhulu, or Ramalinga Reddy. It is normally the prerogative of the Chief Minister. This itself is a message to people who are trying to create unnecessary issues. This sentiment may not last long or impact the board elections”.
