If the reports appearing in various sections of the media are to be believed, the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS), led by former Telangana chief minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, is all set to surrender to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) sooner or later.
With party MLAs, MLCs, and other senior leaders quitting the BRS one after the other and KCR’s daughter Kalvakuntla Kavitha continuing to languish in jail in connection with the Delhi liquor scam, the BRS leadership is understood to have offered to join the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance and extend unconditional support to the Narendra Modi government.
According to these reports, for the last week, BRS working president K. T. Rama Rao and his brother-in-law and senior leader T. Harish Rao have been camping in New Delhi to negotiate the deal with the BJP national leadership.
“Things are likely to come to a concluding stage soon,” the reports said.
There are also reports that the BRS chief has proposed to merge his parliamentary party with the BJP.
The BRS doesn’t have any Lok Sabha members, but has four Rajya Sabha members – K. R. Suresh Reddy, Vaddiraju Ravichandra, D. Damodar Rao, and K. Parthasarathy Reddy – who would be merging with the BJP.
Since the BJP is falling short of a majority in the Rajya Sabha by a few seats, the BRS offer might help the national party. It is not immediately known what the response of the BJP national leadership is to the offer so far.
A report in a national newspaper said an alliance between the BRS and the BJP could be on the cards in Telangana and that talks between leaders from the two parties have started.
The report pointed out that while some leaders in the BJP want an alliance, others have called for a complete merger of the BRS with the BJP.
However, there are some within the BJP who do not want any alliance with the BRS because they feel that the latter's leadership has been discredited following its poor performance in the assembly polls and a significant loss in the Lok Sabha elections.
“Anything can happen in politics, and nothing can be ruled out,” the newspaper report quoted a BRS leader as saying.