Mission Telangana: 18 yrs on, BJP conclave is back in Hyderabad 

HYDERABAD:  Much has changed in the 18 years since the BJP held last held its national executive meeting in Hyderabad. There is a new energy coursing through the party and saffron leaders hope this will help keep the momentum going.

At the last national executive meeting the party held in Hyderabad (at the Viceroy Hotel in 2004), the party had focused more on getting absolute majority at the Centre, and in these 18 years, it has gone from strength to strength, ruling 18 states as well as the Centre.

With 18 Chief Ministers, Deputy Chief Ministers, all Union Ministers and the entire top brass of the party descending in Hyderabad, it is clear that the party wants to make an authoritative statement that it is keen to add Telangana to its ever-lengthening list of the states it rules. 

With the TRS not yielding an inch, the saffron party may face an uphill battle, but that has not stopped it from dispatching its vistaraks across Telangana. These vistaraks have been told to hold booth-strengthening meetings in all 119 Assembly segments with the party’s cadres on June 30 and July 1. 

Though State BJP leaders maintain that only national-level resolutions will be passed in the executive council meetings, the party’s State in-charge had recently indicated that state-specific resolutions could be adopted.

“One weapon that will hit Congress and all other regional parties is the BJP’s war on dynastic rule in the country. There will be discussions on the preparations for the upcoming Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh elections. There will be some kind of activity related to south India, specifically Telangana,” P Muralidhar Rao, BJP in-charge for Madhya Pradesh, told Express, adding that there will also be discussions on development-related and post-pandemic issues during the conclave.

BJP sets target of 10 lakh for Modi public meeting

BJP’s national general secretaries held a meeting late on Friday to set the agenda for issues to be discussed in the conclave. The party’s national officer- bearers will be holding another meeting at 10 am on Saturday, to present the proposed resolutions to the national executive. Meanwhile, BJP state president JP Nadda reached the city on Friday, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi would be arriving at around 3 pm at Begumpet Airport on Saturday to join the 347 delegates that are expected to attend the meetings.

The conclave will conclude with Modi’s address at 4 pm on Sunday, after which he is expected to address a massive gathering of party workers at the Parade Ground in Secunderabad. BJP leaders say that they plan to mobilise 10 lakh people for the event, called ‘Vijaya Sankalpa Sabha’, that they hope will catapult the party to power in Telangana when the State goes to polls in 2023. Telangana has been a sentiment for BJP ever since it was formed, as it elected one of the only two MPs in the 1984 General Elections.

“We know that it was the strength of our workers in Telangana that helped us grow from two to 303 seats in the Lok Sabha. We have enough work for all of you all to keep you occupied for the next 365 days. Work hard and we can form the government in Telangana,” declared Raman Singh, former chief minister of Chhattisgarh, during an interaction with the booth-committee members of Goshamahal constituency at the party office on Friday.

Incidentally, the last time the BJP held its national executive meetings in Hyderabad was at the Viceroy Hotel in 2004, when the party had focused more on getting absolute majority at the Centre. At the behest of the then alliance partner and chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu, a proposal to go for early general elections was discussed during the meetings. Though a section of the BJP’s State leadership had opposed the idea, its central leadership agreed and the party went for early polls with the tagline ‘India Shining’. As they say, the rest is history.