Sonia to pep up Congress campaign in Telangana

Hyderabad: With the Election Commission sounding the bugle for Assembly elections in Telangana, the Congress, which does not want to lose precious time anymore, has decided to invite UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi to address a couple of public meetings to shore up the prospects of the party candidates. According to sources, Sonia Gandhi will be addressing two major public meetings one each at Karimnagar and Hyderabad. 

The TPCC is yet to finalise the dates for the public meetings. Depending on her availability, the dates would be fixed in a couple of days, sources said.  The party is also keen that party president Rahul Gandhi too should address a few meetings to infuse new lease of life into the party cadres. Rahul Gandhi is expected to visit the state in November and his schedule would be decided keeping his election meetings in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Mizoram. This apart, the Congress wants to go in for a campaign blitzkrieg for 18 days non-stop from October 10 to November 2. The campaign committee headed by Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka has prepared the campaign schedule up to November 2. 

The top leaders of the PCC would address about 50 roadshows and public meetings during the campaign period. The top leaders of the PCC, Uttam Kumar Reddy, Jana Reddy, Shabbir Ali, Revanth Reddy, Vijaya Shanthi and PCC in-charge RC Khuntia would participate in these meetings. The Congress would use helicopters to save time. They would make night halts at some areas and would return to Hyderabad during the breaks.  

According to the schedule issued by the campaign committee, the leaders would depart by helicopter to Kothakota of old Mahabubnagar district at 10 am on October 10 and would participate in poll programmes at 11 am. On the same day, they would visit Amarachintha, Atmakur, Makthal, and Narayanapet. On Oct 12, roadshow and public meeting would be held at Kollapur, on Oct 13 at Devarakonda, on Oct 14 at Nakerakal, on Oct 15 at Suryapet, on Oct 16 at Palair and Khammam, on Oct 20 at Bonakal and on Oct 21 at Bhadrachalam. A break would be given on Oct 22 and 23 and the programme would commence on Oct 24 at Adilabad. On Oct 25, campaign would be conducted at Khanapur, on Oct 26 at Bellampally and break would be given on Oct 27. 

The campaign would resume on Oct 28 at Manthani, on Oct  29 at Jagityal, on Oct  30 at Karimnagar, on Oct  31 at Janagaon, on Nov 1 Palakurthy, and on Nov 2 at Parakal. Meanwhile, the Congress wants to ensure that the mistakes committed while selecting candidates in the previous elections should not recur in picking up the nominees for the next polls to the Assembly. For the first time, the party has been using scientific methods in selecting the candidates and results of them would be used for picking up the winning horses.

According to party seniors, no proper survey has been held in the 2014 elections to the Assembly and candidates have been picked up without assessing their winning chances. This had cost 10 seats for the party then. It lost the elections in Maheshwaram, Ibrahimpatnam, Munugodu, Kothagudem and six other constituencies in the 2014 elections due to wrong selection of candidates. It lost about five seats due to the rebel trouble.