Hyderabad: Buoyed by the euphoric response to his roadshows and campaign in the 17 Lok Sabha constituencies across the state, TPCC president and Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy expressed supreme confidence that the Congress would win 14 out of 17 seats in the state.
Revanth Reddy dubbed the Lok Sabha elections, for which the voting is slated to be held on May 13, as an emotional battle between “Telangana pride” and “Gujarat’s arrogance” since Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union home minister Amit Shah have deployed hundreds of Delhi police directly in Hyderabad, and other parts of the state under the guise of ‘election security’. Their main duty apparently is to detain Congress leaders in the case relating to the purported doctored video of Amit Shah on abolishing reservations.
Revanth Reddy questioned BRS chief K. Chandrashekar Rao and its working president K.T. Rama Rao’s silence on this issue, wondering why “they were keeping mum when Delhi sultans were attacking Telangana using Delhi police force.”
Amid his busy campaign schedule of election meetings and road shows, Revanth Reddy, in an exclusive interview with Deccan Chronicle on Monday, spoke about a wide range of issues, including the 14-plus seats target in Telangana for Lok Sabha polls, the straight fight between Congress and BJP with BRS having lost its relevance and his decision to treat the Lok Sabha elections mandate as a ‘referendum’ on his five-month-old government.
Revanth Reddy said that the Delhi police were overstepping their jurisdiction, detaining Congress leaders and were neither consulting the state government nor the DGP while discharging their duties, violating both the democratic spirit of Federal India and its states’ structure, as well as the model code of conduct and elections.
Revanth Reddy, who also received notice from Delhi police to attend for inquiry, made it clear that he would not be cowed down by such “cheap tactics”, admonishing that Modi and Amit Shah would meet the same fate as the Razakars and Nizams, if they try to intimidate him.
