Shah, Nadda meetings to target Ponguleti, Jupally home turfs

HYDERABAD: When Union home minister Amit Shah arrives in Khammam town on June 15 to address a BJP public meeting as part of the party’s Maha Jan Sampark Abhiyan, he will not be doing so just to address a large crowd.

The choice of the public meeting venue, according to state party leaders, has been chosen after much deliberation, to make a strong point that the BJP has the kind of presence in Khammam, and Bhadradri Kothagudem districts, considered by some as areas where former BRS leader Ponguleti Srinivas Reddy wields influence.

A similar strategy of a show of force has led to the party select Nagarkurnool as the venue for a public meeting on June 25 to be addressed by BJP president J.P. Nadda. When Nadda steps foot into Nagarkurnool, he will doing so into a territory where another former BRS leader, Jupally Krishna Rao,  claims strong following.

Srinivas Reddy and Krishna Rao, after being suspended from BRS, have been wooed by both the BJP and the Congress parties to join them but so far, the two leaders have been playing their cards close to their chests. The Congress has been claiming that they have agreed to join it, the BJP’s admissions committee’s chairman Etela Rajendar’s recent comments that they are not likely to embrace the BJP left the party in doubt over where the two former BRS leaders might be headed.

“The BJP would have welcomed them but it is their choice. It was a two-pronged decision why Khammam and Nagarkurnool were selected for Shah’s and Nadda’s public meetings. One to show everyone that we have presence and strength in erstwhile Khammam and Mahbubnagar districts, and two, to demonstrate that two individuals, even if they claim have strong presence in their respective districts, do not deter the BJP, or lead to some apprehension on how we will do in the Assembly elections,” a senior state party leader told Deccan Chronicle.

Though Srinivas Reddy and Krishna Rao were yet to officially declare their intentions, the BJP’s public meetings also leave open some room for these two former BRS leaders to manoeuvre in case they do decide to join the BJP in the presence of senior party leaders like Shah and Nadda, BJP sources said.