Putting behind the disappointment of losing the Assembly polls in Telangana, the Opposition BJP and BRS have started preparing for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections in the state.

Stakes are high for both the parties since BRS needs to stop erosion of any more of its vote bank while the BJP, which notched up eight seats in the last Assembly elections, will have to put up a good fight to retain its four Lok Sabha seats since all three MPs who fought in the Assembly tasted defeat. The party also could not win a single seat under Secunderabad Lok Sabha constituency.

Senior BJP leader Amit Shah has set an ambitious target of ten seats for the party out of 17 in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections though the party’s winning seats in the Assembly elections were limited to North Telangana. He held discussions with senior leaders, including Tarun Chugh, national general secretary, Telangana unit president G Kishan Reddy, national general secretary Bandi Sanjay and former MLA Etela Rajender who had headed the election management committee for Assembly elections.

His advice to the senior leaders was to work together for the Lok Sabha elections to secure the party’s victory instead of fighting for personal goals. All four BJP MPs are going to be given tickets while the two former MLAs, Etela Rajender and Raghunandan Rao, who lost the Assembly elections, will get tickets for the MP elections.

The saffron party hopes to do better in the general elections since Telangana voters vote differently for assembly and the parliamentary elections. Last time, it had only one MLA in the Assembly but four months later in the general elections of 2019 it secured four Lok Sabha seats.

Similarly, the Congress, which won 19 Assembly seats, got three seats in the Lok Sabha even though none of the national-level leaders even campaigned in Telangana. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is quite popular among voters, which will be another ace for the BJP.

In contrast, it is the BRS which will be facing an uphill task to keep its flock together and hold on to its vote bank as the two national parties will fight it out. In a departure from its centralised way of functioning where all such decisions were left to BRS supremo K Chandrasekhar Rao, including the selection of candidates, this time the party has decided on a more democratic style of functioning.

From 3 January till 21 January, barring a three-day break for Sankranthi celebrations, the party will hold constituency-wise meetings with the local leaders. All the key leaders of each Parliament segment, including grassroots leaders, former MLAs, MLCs, ZP chairpersons will be invited to the meetings.

According to a statement from the party, “The discussions will revolve around the strategy to be implemented in the upcoming parliamentary elections. By taking inputs and opinions from the leaders attending these meetings the party will prepare an action plan.”

Special emphasis will be laid on those Assembly segments where the party lost by a narrow margin. The BRS had won only nine seats in 2019 elections at a time when it romped to victory just four months ago with 88 MLAs. This time, it would be far more challenging to the party as both the BJP and the Congress are likely to poach on its candidates.