It was a lesson of cricket and that wins can be achieved only through team work rather than individual brilliance for Telangana Congress leaders in their first meeting with new AICC in-charge Manickam Tagore.
The Congress MP from Virudhunagar in Tamil Nadu, who was appointed as the new AICC in-charge for Telangana, made it clear to leaders that defeating the TRS should be the sole aim of the party and that they need to have a winning combination in Telangana.
“We have Sachins and Dhonis in our team. But we need to act as a team with discipline. You don’t see this as a tennis match, but as a cricket match, where every player needs to play a role,” he said in an interaction on Zoom with senior leaders.
Mr. Tagore said it was unfortunate that the Congress could not win Telangana, a State for which Congress president Sonia Gandhi sacrificed another State (Andhra Pradesh) and also a major share of seats in Lok Sabha. “Let’s gift a win to her by defeating TRS in the next Assembly elections,” he said.
During the three-hour meet, Mr. Tagore made it clear that the party would adopt a zero tolerance policy for indiscipline. He said he would visit Hyderabad in the first week of October after getting a brief from Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi after their return from abroad.
Earlier, TPCC president Uttam Kumar Reddy introduced all the leaders to Mr. Tagore. He said that the main focus of the meeting was the membership drive, Dubbak by-elections, municipal elections in GHMC, Warangal and Khammam and MLC election from Nalgonda, Warangal and Khammam Graduate Constituency. He said that the candidates for Dubbak by-elections would be finalised soon and a panel of leaders would be deployed full time for Dubbak by-polls.
CLP leader Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka, MPs A. Reventh Reddy and Komatireddy Venkatreddy, MLAs Sridhar Babu, Jagga Reddy and Seethakka, MLC T. Jeevan Reddy, AICC secretaries N. Bose Raju, Srinivasan Krishnan, Vamshichand Reddy, A. Sampath Kumar, G. Chinna Reddy, Madhu Yashki Goud, TPCC working presidents Ponnam Prabhakar and J. Kusum Kumar, and senior leaders K. Jana Reddy, Mohammed Ali Shabbir, Damodar Rajanarasimha, V. Hanumantha Rao and Ponnala Lakshmaiah were present.