HYDERABAD: To drum up support from non-BJP and non-Congress parties in order to challenge the Narendra Modi-led BJP government at the Centre, BRS president and Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao is reportedly working on organising a rally in the national capital with seven non-BJP CMs during the month-long break for the Parliament Budget session between February 14 and March 12.
The CM is planning to invite West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee and Bihar CM Nitish Kumar — with whom he has not held public meetings — along with the CMs of Delhi, Punjab, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Jharkhand. In addition to the seven CMs, Akhilesh Yadav (Samajwadi Party), H.D. Kumaraswamy (JDS), and national leaders of the Left Parties will be invited.
The rally in the Capital comes after the CM planned to hold a second public meeting in Parade Ground in Secunderabad with two CMs on February 17, following the huge success of the BRS event in Khammam on January 18, which was attended by Rao’s counterparts Arvind Kejriwal from Delhi, Bhagwant Mann from Punjab and Pinarayi Vijayan from Kerala, besides Akhilesh Yadav. The CM hopes to further bolster the opposition strength in his united efforts to take on the Modi government at the Centre in the 2024 elections.
Party sources said that the CM had decided to put the BRS on the fast track after the Budget session of the Telangana Legislative Assembly ended, by expanding party activities to various states. The Budget session of the Assembly will commence on February 3.
In between, the CM has decided to visit Nanded in Maharashtra on February 5 to launch the party activities in that state by holding meetings with leaders of farmers’ unions and other organisations. It is expected that leaders from a few political parties in Maharashtra would join the BRS in the presence of the CM.
Rao intends to focus on expanding the party activities to various states in February. For this reason, he has decided to cut short Budget session working days to a week. Typically, the Budget sessions are held for two or three weeks. The state Budget is expected to be presented on February 3 and the session is expected to end by February 11 with just seven working days.
The CM is reportedly waiting for the Union Budget to be presented on February 1 to garner support of the non-BJP parties against the BJP-led government at the Centre with reports of the Centre planning to impose more restrictions on loans to be borrowed by the state governments in the Union Budget.
States are feeling the pinch of restrictions on loans imposed by the Centre in 2022-23, and there are fears that states may face financial crisis if more restrictions are imposed. Bihar CM Nitish Kumar already expressed anger over the Centre’s reported moves to reduce the borrowing limits of states further in the fiscal 2023-24. Rao also expressed anger over the Centre’s restrictions imposed in 2022-23 stating that Telangana suffered a loss of nearly Rs 40,000 crore.
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