Hyderabad: A dilemma afflicts Telangana Rashtra Samithi founder K. Chandrasekhar Rao when it comes to his position in the presidential election.
As many as 4,809 electors will vote for the next and 16th president of the country on July 18.
Rao’s distance from both the Bharatiya Janata Party and Congress has isolated him from this election process in which there are broadly five groups: BJP and other parts of the National Democratic Alliance, its supporters from outside like Jaganmohan Reddy’s YSR Congress and Naveen Patnaik’s Biju Janata Dal, Congress and other parts of the United Progressive Alliance, its supporters from outside like Shiv Sena and Trinamool Congress, and the Left parties.
Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party, and Punjab’s Shiromani Akali Dal, like KCR’s TRS, have chosen to maintain equal distance from the NDA and the UPA.
These three parties therefore skipped the June 15 meeting convened by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in Delhi to arrive at a consensus on the choice of an opposition candidate for the President’s post.
With no allies visible, except for Kejriwal, TRS has little opportunity to float a candidate of his own.
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Earlier, he had reached out to Kejriwal, Banerjee, Janata Dal (Secular)’s H.D. Deve Gowda and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam leader and Tamil Nadu CM M.K. Stalin to enlist support for a candidate who could be an alternative to those of the NDA and the UPA. But his move failed to work as they were all averse to KCR’s equidistant approach.
Testing waters
Even Andhra CM Jaganmohan Reddy, whom KCR has fondly described as his foster son, has been sending out clear signals that he will back the NDA candidate and not join KCR.
Thus, KCR gave up ‘third front’ plans and instead mooted his own national party, Bharatiya Rashtra Samithi (BRS), leaving his home turf to his son K.T. Rama Rao.
KCR’s party has nine members in Lok Sabha and seven in the Rajya Sabha. Besides, it has 102 seats in the state assembly out of 119. The total value of TRS’s votes works out to around 31,000 – roughly 3% of the total 10.98 lakh-odd votes in the electoral college, which comprises is tasked with the election of the new president.
Many believe KCR would have to abstain from voting if he is to remain equidistant from the Congress and BJP – something that is necessitated given Telangana’s political equation where TRS is an alternative to both parties.
After KCR struck a deal with poll consultant Prashant Kishor, at a time when speculation was rife that he would join Congress, BJP was quick to dub TRS the ‘B-team’ of the grand old party.
It is equally unlikely that the TRS will support the Congress-backed presidential candidate.
After the NDA, under the leadership of Narendra Modi came to power in 2014, KCR as the first chief minister of the country’s youngest southern state, shared a bonhomie with the Union government which was visible in his backing of almost all the bills in the parliament.
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Later, he changed his stance towards the Modi government after BJP started making forays into his home turf since the general elections of 2019. If the TRS supports the NDA candidate in this backdrop, Congress leaders will be quick to cast doubts over his state politics.
Hobnobbing with Congress and BJP to suit his interests is unlikely to suit KCR at this stage.
The most important thing here is that KCR’s support matters very little in these elections.
Hyderabad-analyst and All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen MLC Sayed Amin Jafri told The Wire that the NDA is short of just of 1.2% of the magic number and with the support of Jagan Reddy – with his party’s 4% vote share thanks to its state assembly (151), Lok Sabha (22) and Rajya Sabha (9) strength – it can easily overcome the deficit.
In addition, Naveen Patnaik’s BJD has a 31,000 vote share. It is to be noted that both BJD and YSR Congress had backed the NDA in the previous presidential elections.
“KCR’s stand in the elections is mere academic discussion,” observed Jafri.
