Telangana crisis keeps TDP's 2014 hopes low

Hyderabad: For Telugu Desam Party (TDP), capturing power in 2014 elections, will be easier said than done. The party leaders themselves admit the difficulty given the new political factors that have come to stay like the Telanagana movement and the emergence of Jagan Mohan Reddy.

But the party leaders were not losing heart. They want to build the path to power brick by brick and seem to be prepared till 2019 if not by 2014. The party’s total rout in Telangana and Andhra regions in the recent byelections is something the party abhors to recall. As general elections are just two years away, the TDP does not foresee any shift in voters’ preference either in Telangana or coastal Andhra.

One TDP leader said: “The state bifurcation issue has created a crisis in our party. The leadership fails to assess its seriousness. If it remains dogged about being ambiguous on the issue, it will have to pay a heavy price in Telangana region in the next elections.”

Another senior leader said that the state politics depend on the Centre’s decision on Telangana. “This would decide the future of the YSR Congress and the TRS. If Telangana state is created TRS will merge with the Congress and in coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema regions, a situation may arise where Jagan might be interested in merging his party with the Congress which will be nothing but a home coming for him.” In such a situation, there would be only two parties - Congress and the TDP and we know how to fight Congress in both the states.”

If the Centre does not take any decision on Telangana, then there would be a serious problem. The TDP has lost its base in Telangana already and in Seemandhra is facing a serious threat from Jagan whose weapons are money and sympathy. One TDP leader said if Telangana issue has become so serious as it is today, it is because the Congress has encouraged it so that the Telugu Desam could be edged out of the political space in Telangana. In the process it too had suffered because it also could not take a definite stand on the issue like the TDP.

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