Telangana poll scenario dynamic

​Hyderabad: Andhra Octopus and former MP Lagadapati Rajagopal on Wednesday asserted that he did not do the Telangana poll survey on the request of any political party and that it was done on his own and it is not partisan in favour of any party.

“I have never done any bogus survey in my life. Even when I did a survey in September after the dissolution of Telangana Assembly on the request of IT minister KT Rama Rao, it was very objective. At that time the situation was favourable for the TRS and that was why he predicted an unbeatable margin for the pink party, in reply to KTR’s outburst against him that the survey was baseless and looked like future telling by a parrot. KTR described the survey as one that was “concocted” and that Lagadapati was trying to set a cat among the pigeons. 

Rajagopal, speaking to mediapersons, however, said that when he did the recent survey the situation had changed. This time he did it on his own and even then, he did not specify how many seats either the TRS or the People’s Front would win. “I was specific in respect of independents. In Tirupati, I spelt out two names and on Tuesday three more names. 

As the situation was conducive for the Congress, I said trend was in favour of the grand old party,” Rajagopal said. The former MP said he did not meet KTR during the last four and a half years except once at his relatives’ house. KTR had initially requested me to do survey in respect of 23 seats and later wanted survey done for another 37 seats. When he did the survey for KTR, People’s Front had not been formed. 

“I told KTR that though the trend was in favour of the TRS, there was anti-incumbency against 65 per cent of MLAs and cautioned him about the pitfalls and grey areas in the TRS’ approach to elections. In fact, KTR was thankful to him for the advice,” Rajagopal said.