Ever since Telangana Rashtra Samithi president and chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao dissolved the earlier state assembly on September 6, he had been consistently saying that his party would achieve not less than 100 seats in the 119-member assembly.
His party leaders including his son K T Rama Rao and daughter K Kavitha also used to talk about Mission 100 – of achieving 100 assembly seats. They were aiming at restricting all the opposition parties including the Congress to a single digit.
When the assembly elections were over and results were declared on December 11, the TRS ended up with 88 seats and KCR’s mission fell short of 12 seats, for various reasons including formation of grand alliance of four opposition parties and rebel factor within the TRS.In fact, KCR said the party would have won at least another 17-18 seats, but for the mistakes committed by his own party leaders, particularly in Khammam.
But even after the elections are over, KCR did not stop efforts to accomplish his Mission 100.
Within 24 hours of the declaration of the election results, two independents – Kortukanti Chander Rao from Ramagundam and Ramulu Naik from Wyra met KCR’s son K T Rama Rao and announced their intention to join the TRS.
With their entry into the TRS, the total number of seats of the party mounted to 90. So, another 10 seats are required for the TRS to achieve the Mission 100. So, KCR started bringing pressure on the opposition MLAs to join the TRS.
On the second day itself, he started playing a mind game with the opposition, saying several MLAs from the opposition, particularly from Congress, were showing interest in joining his party.
Names of Congress MLAs such as Haripriya Naik from Yellandu, Vanama Venkateshwar Rao from Kothagudem (both from Khammam district), D Sudhir Reddy from L B Nagar and Sabita Indra Reddy from Maheshwaram (both in Greater Hyderabad); and TDP MLA Macha Nageshwara Rao from Ashwaraopet, were doing rounds in the political circles. Some of them condemned these rumours, while others remained silent.
Apparently, KCR is trying to bring pressure on the opposition MLAs to join the TRS using various tactics like denial of MLA funds for development, ignoring them in all official programmes, fixing them in various cases and also luring them with projects and contracts.
“If not now, at least at a later stages, some of these MLAs will have to join the TRS. In any case, there is support from seven MIM legislators. So, it is not very difficult to achieve the target 100,” a TRS leader said.
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