Telangana: Mahakutami shapes up to take on KCR, but will it be a 2009 repeat?

Hyderabad, Sep 11: It is alliance time as India's newest state, Telangana gets set to face an election in the next few months. In a bid to take on the TRS led by K Chandrasekhar Rao, the opposition has been trying to stitch up a Mahakutami or grand alliance.

The Telangana unit of the Telugu Desal Party (T-TDP) has been trying to get on board, the Congress, CPI, CPM and the Telangana Jana Samiti.

While all seemed hunky-dory at first, the trouble began over the issue of seat sharing. While it appears to be smooth sailing for now for the T-TDP and Congress, there appears to be some challenge posed by the other units.

The CPM had formed the Left Bahujan Samaj Front which comprised 31 social organisations. The CPM has now conveyed to the TDP that it would not join the alliance. The reason cited by the CPM was that it had formed the LBS to counter the Congress and BJP. Now with the Congress being part of the grand alliance, it would not be right on its part to join it.

While the T-TDP would have trouble in bringing the CPM on board, it would have no such issues with the Congress, CPI and the TJS. The party is confident that the grand alliance would be ready in the next couple of days and they would fight the TRS on a united platform.

This is not for the first time that Naidu has tried to stitch up a Mahakutami. He did so with the support of the CPI, TRS and CPM in 2009, but the alliance was washed away by the Y S Rajashekar Reddy wave. The reason for the debacle was owing largely to the immense popularity of YSR and the internal bickering within the alliance.