Hyderabad civic polls: KTR says no alliance with Owaisi’s MIM

Hyderabad: Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) working president and state minister for IT, municipal administration and urban development K T Rama Rao on Thursday clarified that his party would not have any alliance with All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) in the GHMC elections.

In a meet-the-press programme organized by the Press Club of Hyderabad, KTR said the TRS would not have any alliance, whatsoever, with the AIMIM. “As we had done in the past, we shall contest in all the 150 divisions. In the last elections, the TRS won five seats in the MIM strongholds. This time, we are aiming at winning 10 seats,” he said.

Dispelling the rumors spread that the Mayor post would be offered to an MIM corporator, KTR said, “After the results on December 4, it will be a TRS woman corporator who will be made the Mayor.” The Hyderabad Mayor post is reserved for a woman from general category this time.

However, three days ago AIMIM chief and Hyderabad Member of the Parliament Asaduddin Owaisi attended a meeting of the TRS leaders convened by TRS supremo K. Chandrashekar Rao at Pragati Bhavan to discuss the strategy for GHMC polls.

The elections for GHMC will be held on December 1 and the results will be declared by December 4, the Telangana State Election Commission said on Tuesday. The nomination process began on Wednesday (November 18) and will end on Friday. In the last elections held in December 2015, the first after the formation of Telangana, the TRS had won 99 out of 150 seats and AIMIM had bagged 44 seats.