Lok Sabha elections are around the corner and the ruling Congress Party in Telangana is aiming to show its prowess by winning maximum seats in the state.
Winning South Telangana will be an achievable task for Congress but winning Central and North Telangana would be tough. Especially, winning the Medak seat would be a herculean task as it is considered the fortress of BRS.
BRS has been winning the Medak Lok Sabha seat consecutively for the last 20 years. In 2004, Ale Narendra won the seat representing this party. In 2009, Vijayashanti claimed the seat from the same party.
In 2014, BRS chief KCR won the Medak Lok Sabha seat. But after assuming the role of Telangana’s Chief Minister, KCR resigned from his MP position. In the same year, Kotha Prabhakar Reddy from the same party won the seat. He also won the 2019 elections with a mammoth majority.
There are seven assembly constituencies in Medak Lok Sabha constituency: Medak, Siddipet, Dubbak, Gajwel, Narsapur, Sangareddy and Patancheru. In the 2023 Assembly elections, BRS won six out of these seven seats. This proves the strength of BRS in Medak. Only in the Medak assembly segment, Congress’s Mynampally Rohit managed to win over BRS.
Now, Congress is especially focusing on this constituency. CM Revanth Reddy believes that winning Medak would further sink BRS’s future in Telangana. He fielded Patancheru’s BC leader Neelam Madhu as its candidate.
BJP gave ticket to former Dubbak MLA Raghunandan Rao. As Kotha Prabhakar Reddy became Dubbak MLA, BRS gave the MP ticket to former Siddipet collector and MLC P. Venkatram Reddy.
Both Neelam Madhu and Venkatram Reddy are fresh faces in Lok Sabha polls. Raghunandan Rao is a prominent leader. He has an edge over his competitors in terms of face value.
Congress wants to bank on BC votes because the candidates of BRS and BJP belong to the Reddy and Velama communities respectively. The party also gained positivity among women in the state due to its welfare schemes. If Congress manages to win a majority of BC and women votes, it could win the seat.
But state-sentiment played a major role in Medak all these years. BRS is banking on the same sentiment this time too. We have to see how Congress manages to break this sentiment among people.
