BJP eyes surge in Telangana, to go it alone in 2019 polls

BJP sees Telangana as a fertile ground for a surge as it pursues an ambitious plan in the country's newest State, where it would go alone in the 2019 Lok Sabha and Assembly elections, dumping TDP.

Telangana party spokesperson Krishna Saagar Rao said a pattern is emerging nationally whereby there is a huge surge in demand for a BJP-kind of rule, even in States where regional outfits held sway, referring the recent Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, where it scored a landslide win.

"We are actually looking at Telangana from that perspective. Telangana is a viable story for us to be ambitious," he told PTI in an interview.

"We see an imminent rise in Telangana, and we have very ambitious plan ahead," he said.

The party is preparing for 2019 Lok Sabha polls, and Assembly elections, which it expects to be pre-term.

"Misgovernance of TRS government and non-delivery of promises in manifesto have given the BJP a massive electoral pitch to come to power in Telangana," Rao said.

In the 2014 Assembly elections, TRS won 63 seats, followed by Congress 21, TDP 15, AIMIM 7 and the BJP 5. BJP and TDP had an electoral alliance then.

The Congress has lost "aspirational value" in the eyes of people, Rao claimed, adding, BJP is a natural alternative to the TRS.

Terming Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP President Amit Shah and the party's ideology as a "powerful combination", he said "people are buying our model".

First objective is to defeat the AIMIM in Hyderabad. "That has to happen in 2019... Is the objective of the BJP... We are going to break that continuity," he said referring to Asaduddin Owaisi-led party winning Assembly seats in Old City areas and Hyderabad Lok Sabha seat.

Rao claimed that some leaders of Congress and TDP are in touch with his party seeking to enter its fold.

"We are going it alone. It's 100 per cent clear stand of the party. There is no chance of any alliance with any party," he said.

"The model is like in Maharashtra where despite having insync with ideology with Shiv Sena for last 25 years, we had to go on our own, and we did that even in municipal elections. So, BJP is now on an upswing and we are detaching from alliances and moving forward," Rao said.

Noting that 12 of the TDP's 15 MLAs have joined TRS, he said the N Chandrababu Naidu-led party is in the process of "natural extinction" in Telangana, and does not have space to win in electoral politics any more in the State.

In the 2014 elections, "It's BJP which has added value to TDP in the city, and not the other way round. They (TDP) got benefitted. We have taken a huge loss by being with them last time," Rao said.