KCR uses farmers to unite Opp.

Telangana Rashtra Samiti Party supremo and Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao took another bold step in trying to create a common understanding amongst key Opposition leaders nationally and use the upcoming elections for the post of President and Vice-President to forge unity among non-BJP parties. He has visited New Delhi and Chandigarh so far, and met with the Aam Aadmi Party Chief Ministers of Delhi and Punjab, and Samajwadi Party president and former Uttar Pradesh CM Akhilesh Yadav.

The tricky issue is that Mr Chandrashekar Rao, or KCR as he is popularly known, wants an alliance against the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, without involving the national party, the Congress — largely because of the compulsions in his own state, which is due for elections next year.

This effectively rules out the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) coalition, whose non-Congress Chief Ministers like Mr M.K. Stalin, Mr Uddhav Thackeray and Mr Hemanth Soren, besides NCP chief Sharad Pawar, are all keen on an anti-BJP coalition but with the Congress taking the lead.

This further reduces the scope and options for Mr Chandrashekar Rao, who is fighting a battle of wits against the Centre on a plethora of issues, including procurement of paddy, increasing the state’s loan limits, public confrontation with the Governor, and other issues in the federalism bucket.

Sadly for Chandrashekar Rao, none of the regional chieftains, like Chief Ministers Naveen Patnaik or Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, is keen to take sides at the national level.

Besides Mr Kejriwal, Mr Chandrashekar Rao would also like to bring in Trinamul Congress supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to give his efforts some steam but it is not clear if the two powerful regional satraps with an ambition to prevent the re-election of Prime Minister Narendra Modi could agree on other issues.

But by focusing on farmer issues, Mr Chandrashekar Rao has touched a raw nerve that the other leaders might now want to ignore. And to that extent, he has scored with his first gambit.

Sadly for KCR, none of the regional chieftains, like Chief Ministers Naveen Patnaik or Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, is keen to take sides at the national level.