Sacrifice seats to oust KCR: M Kodandaram

HYDERABAD: Telangana Jana Samithi founder-president M Kodandaram on Thursday appealed to party leaders to be prepared to sacrifice their Assembly seats, as the “main objective of the grand alliance” was to oust the the autocratic KCR family rule.

The state committee meeting of the TJS, which was held for over eight hours on Thursday, witnessed heated discussions over the TJS going soft on the Congress, which is offering them only eight seats.

After listening to all the party leaders, Kodandaram finally spoke around 9pm. He told leaders to realise that every ally, including the Congress, has come forward to sacrifice the Assembly seats it originally planned to contest before the grand alliance was formed.

“The T-TDP and CPI too are willing to sacrifice their Assembly seats to ensure that the grand alliance gets going,” he said. However, it was not clear whether the TJS leaders were pacified by Kodandaram’s assurances as several state leaders and some of the founding members said they would start campaigning in their Assembly constituencies and would not wait for seat-sharing talks to come to an amicable understanding.

Sources said several leaders were not happy with the stand taken by Kodandaram to compromise on fewer seats and insisted that he should be adamant and ensure that the party gets 15 Assembly segments, including Miryalguda.

The sources said several leaders left the meeting disappointed but a majority of them said they would abide by the decision of Kodandaram.