HYDERABAD: Nearly 800 of the total 1,122 candidates lost their deposit in the GHMC 2020 elections.
Interestingly, the top two parties, the TRS and the BJP which stunned everyone with its impressive show of winning 48 wards too lost deposits.
TRS candidates lost their deposit in over 30 divisions most of which are located in Old City. In GHMC 2016 elections, TRS candidates were runners up in most of the wards in Old City, with MIM winning most seats.
However, in GHMC 2020 polls, BJP emerged runners up replacing the TRS in a majority of the wards in Old City. Political analysts said the TDP-BJP combine vote bank had shifted to the TRS in the 2016 polls and that the saffron party had regained its vote bank in Old City in GHMC 2020 elections.
However, the BJP too lost deposit in over 20 divisions in Old City as both TRS and BJP candidates lost to MIM picks in Old City. The worst-hit was the Congress which contested from 146 wards and lost deposit in over 130 wards.
Even the MIM lost deposits in a few wards in the rest of Hyderabad. However, a majority of candidates who lost their deposits were Independents. TDP, TJS, CPI, CPM and other recognised parties’ candidates too lost deposits.
BJP chief spokesperson Krishna Saagar Rao told TOI that the GHMC election saw the BJP dominate not just in Secunderabad and Cyberabad but also in Old City. In the seats which it has lost, the BJP came second. The BJP has lost deposits in fewer wards compared to TRS and Congress, he said.
“Many Hindus have moved from Old City due to minority appeasement policy of the Congress, TDP and later the TRS. The BJP will do everything possible to ensure that Hindus are resettled in Old City. When BJP comes to power, the process of reversing the migration within Hyderabad will be taken up on a war footing,” Krishna Saagar Rao said.
AICC spokesperson Dasoju Sravan emphasised the “urgent need for an institutional and ideological review” to reinvent and reposition the Congress party. “The revival will be fast if the Congress truly emerges as a party for complete social justice and provides political empowerment to suppressed classes particularly BCs who comprise over 50 per cent of the population in Telangana,” he said.
TRS working president and Municipal minister KT Rama Rao, in a meeting with the corporators, told them not to look down upon party candidates who lost the elections. “They are important to regain lost ground in their respective wards,” he told them.