Hyderabad: Last year’s Telangana Assembly election loss seems to have hit the K Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR)-led Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) quite hard. With the party in disarray due to ongoing defections by MLAs and MPs, KCR’s grand plans to going national also seem to have come to a screeching halt. As things stand it is unsure if the BRS will even contest the upcoming Lok Sabha elections in Maharashtra.
Over the last few years after KCR rechristened the Telangana Rashtra Samithi to BRS to go national, offices were set up in different states. The ex-chief minister specifically was looking at Maharashtra which shares a border with Telangana. A lot of leaders including ex-legislators from Maharashtra had also joined the BRS and made it seem as if something was building up.
However, last year’s shock defeat in the Assembly election seems to have put the brakes on all of KCR’s plans. The BRS is currently dealing with defections, and the party has overall been unable to contain the damage in Telangana. Over the last week sitting MP Ranjith Reddy and incumbent MLA Danam Nagender both joined the Congress. Prior to that, two BRS MPs had joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
BRS’ Maharashtra plans scrapped?
When asked if the party will contest the Lok Sabha polls in Maharashtra as originally announced, a senior BRS functionary said that the earlier announced plans may not go through.
“It is doubtful that BRS will contest outside, especially in Maharashtra. When we are not in power itself in our home state, others will point fingers and ask what we doing in another state. If we were in power, then the situation would have been entirely different. Winning seats in Telangana also for the Lok Sabha election is also not easy since we are not in power,” stated another BRS functionary.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the BRS managed to win only nine out of 17 seats in the state. The Congress, BJP and All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) had won three, four and one seat respectively. The BRS was hoping to win last year’s Assembly polls, but the shock defeat has sent the party downhill at least for now. In the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, the fight is likely to be between the ruling Congress and BJP.
Maharashtra’s complicated political landscape, the BRS and AIMIM
KCR’s entry into Maharashtra politics would have been an interesting development to watch, given the current complicated scenario. The Congress, like in other parts, has recently witnessed the departure of its senior leaders (ex-CM Ashok Chavan). The BJP, which parted ways with the Shiv Sena, has managed to split the Shiv Sena and the Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).
Currently, the Sharad Pawar-led NCP faction and the Uddhav Thackeray faction of the Shiv Sena are with the Congress. The Eknath Shinde-led Shiva Sena group and the Ajit Pawar-led NCP faction are with the ruling BJP in Maharashtra. The BRS waded into this muddy water, which also has the AIMIM and the Prakash Ambedkar-led Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA).
KCR had announced plans for his national ambitions, stating that he would replicate the previous BRS government’s programmes in other states. In Maharashtra, he had even exhorted farmers to come forward, stating he would bring a “sarkar” of farmers.
A political analyst who did not want to be named said that KCR is currently out of the picture. “He has completely lost it, as the party has also weakened. The BRS might end up becoming a marginal third player like the Janata Dal (Secular) in Karnataka,” he added.
