This story is from January 26, 2020

Telangana municipal elections: BJP emerges as largest party in Nizamabad

It was a close call for the Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) in the elections for the Nizamabad Municipal Corporation in which the party won 28 seats. It did emerge as the single largest party with the TRS and AIMIM winning 12 and 17 respectively, taking their combined number to 29. The Congress managed to win two while one division was bagged by an independent. The BJP had only managed to win six divisions in the 2014 elections.
Telangana municipal elections: BJP emerges as largest party in Nizamabad
The BJP office in city was mostly empty on Saturday. BJP stood third in the overall tally, behind TRS and Congress
HYDERABAD: It was a close call for the Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) in the elections for the Nizamabad Municipal Corporation in which the party won 28 seats. It did emerge as the single largest party with the TRS and AIMIM winning 12 and 17 respectively, taking their combined number to 29. The Congress managed to win two while one division was bagged by an independent.
The BJP had only managed to win six divisions in the 2014 elections.
The TRS will bank heavily on bagging the support of the two Congress and one independent winners to take the total rally to 32. The magic figure to get the mayoral post is 31.With elections for the mayor’s post scheduled for January 27, all eyes are now on whether the TRS-AIMIM combine would once again bag the post or whether the BJP can manage to emerge victorious but from where can it get the desired number remains a big question.
Despite three BJP MPs getting elected in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections in the districts, the party’s performance in the municipal elections did not match the projections it had made for itself. In the results declared for 120 municipalities on Saturday, the BJP could bag only two municipalities. In nine municipal corporations, BJP emerged in the second position in the number of wards it won but overall in the state, including in municipalities, it came third after as Congress bagged second position in number of wards won. BJP won 223 seats, while Congress got 495 and the TRS won from more than 1,000 wards. Elections were held for 2,727 wards.
Nizamabad MP Arvind Dharmapuri, while thanking the people of ‘Induru’, said he was dedicating the win to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He alleged that in Division 21, a recounting was done unnecessarily and the TRS candidate was declared elected. The MP said that in Ward 1 too the ballot box seal was found opened but counting was still taken up by officials. He demanded a re-poll in both Wards 1 and 21. “People voted against the AIMIM and it is clear. In many divisions, BJP candidates won by a margin of over 1,000 votes,” Dharmapuri said.
For the MP, what could be encouraging is that the party’s tally of six in the 2014 election, has gone up to 28 in this election. The BJP which dreamt of capturing the mayoral post will be disheartened if it does not. Both Arvind Dharmapuri and also Goshamahal MLA Raja Singh who campaigned relentlessly announced that the name of Nizamabad would be changed to Induru if it came to power. The corporation has 60 divisions.
BJP state president K Laxman said the results demonstrated that the BJP was the only alternative to the TRS in the state. “We will analyse the results and take measures to strengthen the party further for the next general elections,” he said. In the 2014 elections, the TRS had bagged 10, MIM 16, the Congress 16, BJP 6 and independents 2. Taking the support of AIMIM, TRS candidate Akula Sujatha won the mayoral post. This time, she lost in the election. The AIMIM’s Nizamabad district president Fayeem also lost in the polls.

The BJP did not win any municipality in erstwhile Nizamabad, Karimnagar and Adilabad, though BJP MPs got elected from the constituencies in the Lok Sabha elections in 2019. Results of the Karimnagar municipal corporation will be out on January 27 when counting will be taken up. In Adilabad municipality, the BJP won from 11 wards, while TRS got 24 and Congress 5. The MIM also got 5 and others got four. It is clear even here the TRS will gets its chairperson elected.
The run-up to the polls, especially in Nizamabad and Karimnagar was a vitriolic campaign by parties. BJP MPs charged the police with taking the side of the ruling TRS party. The TRS criticised BJP MPs for allegedly raking up communal issues to secure votes.
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About the Author
Ch Sushil Rao

Sushil Rao is Editor-Special Reports, at The Times of India, Hyderabad. He began his journalism career at the age of 20 in 1988. He is a gold medalist in journalism from the Department of Communication and Journalism, Arts College, Osmania University, Hyderabad from where he did his post-graduation from. He has been with The Times of India’s Hyderabad edition since its launch in 2000. He has also done an introductory course in film studies from the Film and Television Institute of India, Pune, and also from the Central University of Kerala equipping himself with the knowledge of filmmaking for film criticism. He has authored four books. In his career spanning 34 years, he has worked for five newspapers and has also done television reporting. He was also a web journalist during internet’s infancy in the mid 1990s in India. He covers defence, politics, diaspora, innovation, administration, the film industry, Hyderabad city and Telangana state, and human interest stories. He is also a podcaster, blogger, does video reporting and makes documentaries.

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