Working president of the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) K. T. Rama Rao has asked the party ranks and leaders to stop blaming people for defeat of the party in the recent Assembly elections with the suggestion that it was they (people) who have been supportive all through, including the successive victories in the 2014 and 2018 polls.
Speaking at the party’s preparatory meeting for the Bhongir Parliamentary Constituency held here on Friday, he said it was time not to sulk over on the defeat but focus on the coming election with a renewed vigour to win majority Lok Sabha seats to prove that the BRS was a force to reckon with and only alternative to the Congress in the State.
He told the meeting that the people had not rejected the BRS outrightly but had given 39 seats and the party had lost another 14 seats with small margins that were manageable with little more efforts. He explained that the reasons identified for the party’s defeat in the preparatory meetings of 10 LS seats held before the one for Bhongir include neglect on the party organisation with total focus on governance and that he would take the blame for it.
Further, he noted that organisational structuring in the party was not done properly, lack of due recognition to those who had come from other parties, neglect of party activists’ economic well being, reach of welfare schemes without the link of activists between the government and beneficiaries, failure to drive home the point on issuance of over 6 lakh new ration cards and new social security pensions of about 15,000 in each Assembly constituency.
The impact of negative publicity from a few those who did not get the benefits including schemes such as Dalit Bandhu, the jealousy of small farmers against large farmers getting Rythu Bandhu benefit and others were also found to be the reasons for the anti-incumbency, Mr. Rama Rao stated.
Instead of focusing on governance to fulfil the promises made the Congress government was trying to bide time by provoking the BRS, he alleged. He also ruled out even the remote possibility of party’s tie up with Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and pointed out that it was BRS that had defeated three sitting MPs and two MLAs of that party in the recent elections.
Party MP B. Lingaiah Yadav, MLAs G. Jagadish Reddy and Palla Rajeshwar Reddy said later that the Congress government was trying to bring back the middlemen system in the delivery of welfare schemes and lack of clarity on the applications received in the name of Praja Palana was indicating that.
