KCR throws his hat in national ring
Compounding Confusion in Opposition
With K Chandrashekar Rao, Chief Minister of
Telangana throwing his hat in the ring by floating a national party, the battle
for the 2024 Lok Sabha poll has become muddier.
His regional party, Telangana Rashtra
Samithi, will now be named as the Bharat
Rashtra Samithi (BRS).
Though KCR, as he is popularly known, may have
claimed that he intends to take on the
BJP, his entry will make the task of
many Opposition parties more difficult to come together to give a united flight
to PM Modi in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Before launching his national party, KCR,
traveled across India and met with several political leaders including his
counterparts in other states - Mamata Banerjee (West Bengal), Nitish Kumar
(Bihar), Arvind Kejriwal (Delhi), MK Stalin (Tamil Nadu), Pinarayi Vijayan
(Kerala) and Naveen Patnaik (Odisha). Since Congress has been a principal
Opposition party in Telangana, KCR wanted to unite all regional parties. But
his game plan did not take off as per his earlier plans. This emerged clear
today when only two regional parties, former Karnataka Chief Minister HD
Kumaraswamy (JD-S) and DMK ally Thol Thirumavalavan attended the launch party.
However, KCR wants to propagate his “Telangana
model of development” as PM Modi successfully marketed his “Gujarat Model”
before the country in 2014. Even AAP convener and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind
Kejriwal obtained a massive majority in Punjab by show-casing his “Delhi
Model.” Bihar Chief Minister Nitish
Kumar has already thrown his hat in the 2024 poll battle by trying to bring
Opposition parties together. KCR’s entry
will muddy the 2024 poll battle further.
The Congress has already dubbed KCR’s efforts
to enter the national scene only to help the BJP and PM Modi by dividing
Opposition votes. Interestingly, the JD (S) is talking to the Congress Party
for a pre-poll alliance in Karnataka in the 2023 Assembly poll.
