The BJP central leadership announcement on Tuesday of making Union Minister for Culture, Tourism and Development of Northeast Region G. Kishan Reddy as the Telangana unit president and former minister and Huzurabad MLA Eatala Rajender was on expected lines.
The party office was agog with activity expecting the development though the main two protagonists maintained silence as also incumbent president Bandi Sanjay Kumar without giving anything away till the official communique was released from head office.
Hours before the breaking news, former MLC N. Ramchander Rao, general secretary G. Premender Reddy, K. Venkateshwarlu and S. Kumar told a press conference that the party gives lot of importance to discipline, therefore crossing the line would surely attract disciplinary action as it had happened to many a stalwart in the past.
Without taking the name of Dubbak MLA M. Raghunandan Rao whose ‘chit chat’ belittling the leadership in both at the Centre and State led to much gnashing of teeth before he disclaimed whatever he had said, the BJP leaders chose to blame the media, BRS and Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao for the internal wrangling.
“We condemn the attacks on Mr. Sanjay Kumar. This is a plot by KCR to defame the BJP since its graph has been up in recent times. We do not have any culture of leaking to the media about differences within the party. The high command has been apprised of the situation and action will be taken suitably,” they said.
“We have had bigger public meetings but a section of the media wants to show Congress is growing when it has lost all the recent elections. How long can they gloat about victory in Karnataka,” they questioned. “We request people not to take note of the unsubstantiated reports about our party in the media as the Modi government is sure to return to power in the Centre and dethrone BRS in Telangana,” they added.
Later in the evening, Mr. Rajender thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, national president J.P. Nadda for elevating him as campaign committee chief and vowed to do his best to ensure the party comes to power.
