Hyderabad: Former Minister & ex-Leader of Opposition in Telangana Legislative Council Mohammed Ali Shabbir said that the results of GHMC elections were severely disappointing, but the Congress party would bounce back soon.
Speaking to media persons at Gandhi Bhavan, Shabbir Ali said that the victory and defeat were not new for the 138-year-old Congress party. He said that the TRS, BJP, and MIM have misled the voters with a false narrative and secured their votes by using all illegal means.
“Chief Minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao has misused the official machinery, deployed entire TRS leadership and cadres from across Telangana State, and used cash, liquor, and other sops to lure the voters. Similarly, BJP has deployed Prime Minister Narender Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, and other union ministers like Prakash Javedkar and Smriti Irani, Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath, ex-CM Devender Fadnavis, and other leaders to win the GHMC elections. Despite these efforts, more than 50% of voters stayed away from polling and remaining voters got misled and voted for TRS, BJP, and MIM,” he said.
Shabbir Ali said that the Congress cadre participated in the election campaign with highly limited resources. They faced the TRS, BJP, and MIM parties with courage and commitment. They did not cheat or mislead the voters and sought voters based on previous performance. Congress party did not try to polarise the voters on communal lines and raised genuine public issues, he said.
The Congress leader said that the Congress party’s vote share has increased significantly in the present elections and soon it would bounce back to power. He reminded that the Congress party had faced a similar situation in 1994 when it won only 26 out of 294 Assembly seats. After facing a series of defeats in subsequent elections, the Congress party returned to power with a thumping majority in 2004 elections. He appealed to the party cadre not to get disheartened with the GHMC results as TRS, BJP and MIM have used hundreds of crores of cash, lakhs of liters of liquor, and all other illegal means to influence the voters.
