NIZAMABAD: Giving a major shock to all political parties, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) emerged victorious in the Nizamabad Municipal Corporation (NMC), infringing all political equations and speculations that prevailed during the municipal elections held on January 22.
Though the ruling pink party managed to bag most urban local bodies (ULBs) across the State, the defeat in NMC has reportedly stupefied the TRS leadership which had expected victory here as well. In a major drawback, the TRS managed to get only the third position in the municipal corporation, behind All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM).
On the other hand, the grand-old Congress party went further down and could only get two seats of the total 60 to which elections were held on Wednesday. Meanwhile, an Independent candidate won one seat in NMC. In the meantime, NMC elections has become the hot topic in most political circles, as most politicos had expected that the saffron party will not be able to emerge victorious here, though it’s candidate Arvind Dharmapuri had managed to get the Nizamabad Lok Sabha seat in the 2018 Parliament elections. As per the final figures published by the Telangana State Election Commission (TSEC), BJP bagged 28 of the total 60 seats under Nizamabad Municipal Corporation. When MIM managed to win 16, the ruling pink party could garner only 13.
Will TRS align with MIM?
Meanwhile, all the eyes are now focused on the mayor post and are waiting to see how the BJP, MIM and TRS will play the cards in their deck to bag the same. Though the saffron party managed to emerge as the single largest party in the city, if the TRS and MIM came forward as a single force, they will have 29 seats in total, which would help them bag the mayor post.
It should be remembered that though the party managed to get only 10 seats in the last civic polls to NMC, it made a pact with MIM, which won 16 seats and was on a tie with the Congress, and bagged the mayor post.‘Hindutva’ helps BJP It is the Hindutva slogan that helped the saffron party emerge as the single largest political party in NMC. As part of the strategy, the cadre and local leaders popularised the Hindutva slogan and continued campaign against TRS and MIM. It should be mentioned that MP Arvind too played a key role in popularising the slogan.