Telangana Rashtra Samithi working president K T Rama Rao on Thursday made a tall claim that his party had enrolled 60 lakh members in the just concluded membership drive.
Reviewing the party activities at the TRS executive committee meeting held at Telangana Bhavan, KTR said the party had emerged as the largest regional party in the country with a record number of over 60 lakh members when the membership drive ended on Thursday.
He appreciated the efforts put by the party workers in making the public take the membership.
"Gajwel and Wardhannapet are ahead of all the regions across the state in the drive," said KTR.
One wonders how reliable are these membership figures are. There are 2.82 crore voters in Telangana, which means the TRS alone accounts for more than 21 per cent of voters.
Assuming that 70 per cent of the voters cast their vote in the elections, the TRS would have nearly 30 per cent of votes in its favour.
In the last assembly elections held in December, the TRS got 97 lakh votes. Going by the present membership figures, it already got 60 lakh votes and it requires another 37 lakh votes to retain power with the same number of seats it won – 88 seats.
Assuming that each TRS member can mobilise at least three more votes, the TRS will get 1.80 crore votes, which means it is going to sweep the next elections once again and the opposition will be completely wiped out.
Now, let us come to other parties. The Congress party is also aiming at enrolling at least 40 lakh members, while the BJP which claims to have 12 lakh members already is targeting to enroll another 18 lakh members.
And there are other parties like MIM and Communist parties which have their own dedicated members.
Going by these figures, it gives an impression that every voter in the state should have been a member of one or other political party. It means, there are no non-political voters in Telangana at all!