TRS emerges as strong political alternative

The political observers feel that now is the appropriate time for such an alternative to emerge on the national platform and Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao revealing his plans to foray into national politics comes at an appropriate time.

Hyderabad: Whenever the topic of the national politics or the BJP and Narendra Modi comes up for discussion, the stock reply from many is, “There is no alternative.” But is the BJP or Modi really unstoppable? Well the answer lies not in the future, but in the past.

One must note that many non-traditional BJP voters have voted to the party since 2014, simply due to lack of a political alternative. Similar was the case for Congress where it was the only alternative to the ruling parties in many States. But the scenario is fast changing with the regional parties taking on the national parties as alternatives in many States.

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The vote/seat share of both BJP and the Congress is fast eroding, with regional parties dominating the elections in majority of the States. Even in Uttar Pradesh where the BJP retained power, it has lost many seats to Samajwadi Party. With all the non-BJP and non-Congress parties now realising the need to join forces, the day is not far when both of them end up sitting in the Opposition benches together which was unimaginable in the past.

Now comes the question whether there is such a need for an alternative force. With rising unemployment, poverty levels, inequality, inflation, corruption, discrimination and communal hatred among others coupled with the BJP’s abuse of central institutions like the ED, CBI and IT to harass opposition party leaders and the Congress’ inability to play its role as principle opposition, the need for an alternative is more than ever.

“In the current political scenario, mere criticism of the BJP or the Congress is not enough. People need definite alternative programmes, and a political party like Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) has proved its mettle with such programmes in Telangana which can be scaled up at the national level. Some of these schemes are already being emulated by the Centre – Rythu Bandhu and Mission Bhagiratha among others to prove that TRS could definitely be the political alternative,” political observers point out.

On the face of it, the BJP presents a picture of an impregnable fortress, but as history would prove, whenever parties in power became autocratic, alternative political force have always emerged especially in a democratic country like India. The classic example which is cited often is that of Indira Gandhi, who was considered the most power politician during her haydays. However, she got defeated by her opponent Raj Narain in 1977 elections and lost Congress-stronghold Rae Bareli. Janata Party led by Lok Nayak Jayaprakash Narayan emerged out of nowhere and had thrown the ‘undefeatable’ Congress out of power. A similar situation was repeated when the United Front coalition government of 13 political parties was formed at the Centre after the 1996 general elections.

The erstwhile Andhra Pradesh too witnessed this feat being achieved by matinee idol NT Rama Rao who came to power within nine months of founding the Telugu Desam Party. When the then TRS President and the current Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao founded the party to fight against the Andhra rulers, many rubbished it as just another political party. Not many have believed that it will emerge as the strongest force in Telangana.

From MG Ramachandran’s AIADMK overthrowing DMK in Tamil Nadu to Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress beating the Left parties to dust in West Bengal and Arvind Kejriwal’s underdog AAP replacing the mighty Congress in Punjab, the list goes on with several such instances. The political observers feel that now is the appropriate time for such an alternative to emerge on the national platform and Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao revealing his plans to foray into national politics comes at an appropriate time, turning out to be an answer to all the prevailing problems.