Telangana urban body polls: Congress, BJP face litmus test; TRS confident of bagging 'lion's share' of seats

Hyderabad: The upcoming urban local bodies polls is going to be a litmus test for both Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in proving their might in urban areas of Telangana even as the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) is confident of bagging “lion’s share” of municipalities and corporations. [caption id=“attachment_7500501” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image. PTI[/caption] The polling for 120 municipalities and nine municipal corporations will be held on 22 January and the results would be declared on 25 January. However, Karimnagar Municipal Corporation will go for polls on 25 January and results will be declared on 27 January. According to the statistics provided by the State Election Commission, the Congress could not field candidates in over 400 wards while BJP in over 700. The polls will be held for 3,052 wards. However, TRS and MIM have already unanimously won 77 and 3 respectively. The Congress Party, which suffered a humiliating defeat in the 2018-Assembly polls could manage to win three Lok Sabha seats in 2019 general elections. Adding insult to the injury, 12 of its 19 members defected to the ruling TRS reducing the number to six. The grand old party also miserably failed to retain its Assembly seat Huzurabad which was vacated by TPCC president Uttam Kumar Reddy after he was elected to Lok Sabha from Nalgonda. The BJP, which could bag only one seat in the Assembly polls, made a quick turn around and managed to win four seats in the last Parliamentary elections, lifting its hopes for better show. “We will win lion’s share of wards and divisions. There are no takers for BJP tickets and Congress is also struggling to field candidates in many seats,” TRS working president and minister KT Rama Rao has said. While Uttam Kumar Reddy blamed the ’erratic and illogical’ poll schedule for the dearth of Congress candidates in some places the BJP alleged that its candidates were threatened to withdraw in many places. “It is important that we need to win respectable seats to boost the morale of our party cadre,” a senior Congress leader told PTI. Both the national parties had failed to put up a good show in rural local bodies elections held last year. The Congress, which released its vision document for the municipal polls is harping on the alleged neglect of civic infrastructure in several municipalities during the TRS regime and large-scale corruption in the administration. Whereas the BJP pins hopes on the failure of poll promises to urban voters made by the Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao and clean image of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “Every election is an acid test for political parties. If they win a good number of seats then the cadre will be in elated mood and if they lose, the status quo will continue,” independent political analyst Professor Nageshwar said. AIMIM which has little presence outside Hyderabad is dependent on its supremo Asaduddin Owaisi to pull in votes, wherever it is contesting while the presence of CPI and CPM is almost insignificant.