BRS aims for hat-trick

Hyderabad: The countdown for Assembly elections has begun with the Election Commission of India announcing the poll schedule. Next 50 days are going to be very crucial for all the parties, particularly the BRS and Congress party. The stage is now set for high-profile visits and sounding of the poll bugle by top leaders for an intense political battle ahead of the November 30 Assembly elections in Telangana. The BRS is looking for a third straight term while opposition BJP and Congress are also fancying their chances.

While the main contest is going to be between the BRS party and the Congress, the significant change this time is that it is going to be a multi-cornered contest. Apart from these two main contenders, the BJP, TDP, Jana Sena will also be in the fray. The two left party’s CPI and CPM are hoping for a tie up with Congress. Left party leaders will be meeting T-Congress leaders on Tuesday.

The BRS is busy evaluating the likely impact of the multi-corner contests. On one hand it is exuding confidence that a multi-corner contest will help the ruling party more as it would result in division of anti-incumbency votes, on the other it is assessing the possibility of losing SC vote bank and the support from voters who had been in Telangana for decades. They do not rule out the possibility of BSP cutting into the SC votes while the party’s silence on the arrest of TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu and the restrictions put on the protests by techies had angered this section which till recently were supporting the pink party.

If the left and Congress succeed in firming up an alliance, it could affect the party’s chances in old Khammam and Nalgonda districts.

BRS has pinned hopes on the development which the government undertook during the past ten years. The opposition Congress, and BJP bank on anti-incumbency and the alleged failures of the incumbent. However, a ground report indicates that there are many houses where the opinion is divided. While the unemployed children are unhappy with the ruling party, the parents and grandparents who enjoy the benefits of welfare schemes are with the pink party.

This time the BRS is planning to make some more additions to the existing welfare schemes like two bags of free urea, Rs 5,000 per month to farmers, increase the Rytu Bandhu to Rs 15,000 per acre and hike in the pension amount under various categories to negate the six guarantees announced by the Congress party. The BRS feels that the anti-incumbency factor on which Congress was highly relying will not work.