Today in Politics: Telangana in PM Modi’s poll itinerary on Sunday, with a bag full of projects
Will she, won't she? Amidst guessing game over her alliance plans, Mayawati holds BSP meeting today for 2024.
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With a packed election season ahead, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be addressing a rally in Mahbubnagar of poll-bound Telangana Sunday, in the course of which he will lay the foundation stone or inaugurate multiple projects worth more than Rs 13,500 crore, covering the range from LPG pipelines and railway lines to university buildings.
Ahead of Modi’s arrival, Union Tourism Minister and Telangana BJP president G Kishan Reddy accused Telangana Chief Minister and BRS chief K Chandrashekar Rao of avoiding the PM’s programmes – not the first time KCR has absented himself from such events.
Announcing his visit to Telangana on X, Modi posted, “The people of Telangana are tired of the lacklustre governance of BRS. They are equally distrustful of Congress. Both BRS and Congress are dynastic parties who have no aim of serving people.”
I will be addressing a @BJP4Telangana rally in Mahbubnagar tomorrow, 1st October. The people of Telangana are tired of the lacklustre governance of BRS. They are equally distrustful of Congress. Both BRS and Congress are dynastic parties who have no aim of serving people.
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 30, 2023
The BJP is counting on Modi magic to see it through the tough Assembly elections, with the PM Saturday holding a rally in poll-bound Chhattisgarh, with another scheduled for the state on October 3.
BSP president Mayawati, whose poll plans have everyone guessing – as reported by Lalmani Verma – will address a meeting of party leaders from Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand on Sunday at the party office in Lucknow. Sources in the famously tight-lipped party said the agenda of the meeting is preparations for the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections.
The Opposition INDIA bloc is hoping that Mayawati will finally go its way, though she has said that she will fight the elections alone. Meanwhile, the BJP and BSP have avoided attacking each other too vociferously, especially when it comes to each other’s leaders. As Lalmani pointed out, the Opposition has before it a long list of the number of times the BSP has supported the BJP government at the Centre on issues.
Haryana elections are further away but Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar, who is also expecting a tough contest next year, will be addressing the BJP’s panna pramukhs at Faridabad Sunday.
Khattar has been holding such meetings across the state as part of the party’s pre-Lok Sabha election campaign. After Faridabad, he will be in Sonipat for another regular event, Jan Samvad (public connect).
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In neighbouring Punjab, the stand-off between the Aam Aadmi Party government and the Opposition Congress over the arrest of outspoken Congress MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira in a 2015 NDPS Act case is set to continue. On Saturday, Khaira was sent to 14-day judicial custody.
Since Khaira’s arrest and the subsequent war of words, both the Congress and AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal have sought to play down the impact of this on their alliance as part of INDIA.
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If the Opposition parties have been calling the AAP government’s action against several of their leaders as “vendetta politics”, that is the theme of the Trinamool Congress as well, which set out with more than 2,500 protesters for Delhi on Saturday.
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With a train they were meant to board being cancelled by the Railways citing unavailability, the protesters are covering the over 1,500-km distance by road. As reported by Ravik Bhattacharya and Atri Mitra, a concern shared by many is the prospect of crossing BJP-ruled Uttar Pradesh. Some of their leaders who are travelling by the Rajdhani or flights will start arriving in the Capital on Sunday.
Watch out for: State Watch, in which Manraj Grewal Sharma explains why the AAP government’s arrest of Sukhpal Khaira is not surprising for Punjab politics.
