For the next few days, till the weekend at least, expect the twin cities to be awash with saffron, with top leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) starting from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Home Minister Amit Shah, national president J.P. Nadda and others coming down to attend the national executive committee as well as the ‘Vijay Sankalpa Sabha’ public meeting at the Parade Grounds on Sunday.
National executive meetings generally do not come with this much hype and hoopla, but this time it is different as the BJP wants to make a big show of its strength and claim the space of the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) through the meetings, pressing in topline leaders to the districts to have booth-level meetings and also hold community-level meetings within the twin cities and elsewhere to lure respective groups into its fold, said party sources on Thursday.
Union Ministers V.K. Singh, Anurag Singh Thakur, Niyanand Rai and others along with former Chief Ministers like Biplab Deb of Tripura, Babulal Marandi of Jharkhand and others are currently touring the districts.
Mr. Nadda will kick off the proceedings with his road show at Shamshabad on Friday before proceeding towards the Novotel Hotel to hoist the party flag and inaugurate the exhibition put up there showcasing the Telangana Armed Struggle, the region’s unique culture, arts and crafts, the party’s growth over the decades and the milestones in the eight-year NDA government led by Narendra Modi.
Real action will begin from Saturday when the party president will address the national office-bearers and this will be followed by the national executive body meeting post lunch. This second meeting is to continue till Sunday afternoon when Mr. Modi will be delivering his address to the delegates.
All these deliberations are out of bounds for others, including the media, who will be briefed by the designated official spokespersons. The grand finale will be the public meeting where almost the entire Union Cabinet, Chief Ministers of 18 States and select State leaders will be on stage when Mr. Modi will deliver his speech, the sources said.
Meanwhile, party delegates, including Union Ministers started arriving for the meetings even as the police and other security agencies put a dragnet around the scheduled meeting places of HICC-Novotel, probable night halt of Raj Bhavan for the Prime Minister and the Begumpet airport for the arrival of the VVIPs.
