Elkathurthy brings back vintage KCR

Party chief's fiery speech sets tone for BRS silver jubilee year; warns Congress that it would be digging its grave if its government did not get its act right

Hyderabad: Cometh the hour, cometh the man. Just as the people of Telangana were at their wit’s end, plagued with erratic power supply, delayed salaries, unjustified demolitions and forcible land acquisitions, water shortage and official apathy bringing woe after woe for farmers, the man under whom the State saw its golden era returned to his elements, breathing fire and signalling that his fight was not yet over. In fact, he looked every inch ready to launch yet another agitation to save the Telangana that he had achieved.

K Chandrashekhar Rao, addressing a mammoth crowd at Elkathurthy to launch the party’s 25th year celebrations, on Sunday was every bit the ‘vintage KCR’, who breathed fire with his words, very much capable of rousing an entire population and launching mass movements. The intent too was there, as he repeatedly told the roaring crowd that the BRS would return to power, that no force could stop it. Even while stating that his party had no intentions of toppling the government, he warned the Congress that it would be digging its own grave if its government did not get its act right.

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Touching upon every point that the people had in their minds, right from the power supply disruptions that were bothering both the general public and the farmers alike, to the financial shambles that the State had slipped into ever since the Congress took over, to even the suppression of people’s voice using the police, Chandrashekhar Rao’s one-hour speech was what the people exactly were waiting for. While the exact numbers are not available, with guesstimates stating that the crowd at Elkathurthy would go over a few lakhs, there were at least three lakh watching the live proceedings on multiple YouTube channels and news channels that were streaming it live.

The thunderous applause that each of his questions met, the nonstop flow of people into Elkathurthy much after the meeting started and the traffic jams that began when police and transport officials tried to stop buses carrying BRS cadre to the venue, all proved one thing — the political currents and dynamics in Telangana are changing from what they were in November 2023 or in May 2024. Congress leaders in Warangal and in the nearby Karimnagar, many of whom were glued to their television sets right through Chandrashekhar Rao’s speech, acknowledged that the fact that the public response to the Silver Jubilee meeting was overwhelming.

Repeatedly asserting that the BRS was the only and true guardian of Telangana’s future, Chandrashekhar Rao had not one but multiple hard-hitting questions for the Congress, even ridiculing the ruling party’s repeatedly changing dates of implementing its promises. Tomorrow they said, then day after, Sankranti, Deepavali, March 31, all these passed and nothing happened, he said, stating that the entire financial situation of the State was destroyed with the unjust and thoughtless policies and acts of the “inexperienced, inefficient” Congress government.