Lok Sabha elections: TDP may field 5-6 candidates in Telangana

HYDERABAD: Still rattled over the party’s defeat in the assembly elections, the Telangana TDP is to take a call on its election strategy at the politburo meeting to be held here on Friday. According to TDP sources, the party might field candidates in five to six Lok Sabha seats in Telangana.


With the Congress deciding to go it alone in Telangana, the TDP aimed for an alliance with the CPI but it fell apart as the two Left parties decided to contest together. Malkajgiri, Khammam, Chevella, Mahabubabad, Adilabad and Warangal are some of the options before the party, an insider told TOI. Telangana TDP also has to decide whether it will support Congress candidates in the Lok Sabha polls. “All these issues will be decided at the politburo meeting,” TTDP president L Ramana told TOI.

The TDP won the Khammam Lok Sabha seat for the first time in 2009 when Nama Nageswara Rao defeated former Congress minister Renuka Chowdary by a huge margin. The TDP also won the Malkajgiri seat in 2014 only to see its victorious candidate C Malla Reddy switch over to the TRS. Apart from these two constituencies, the TDP did well from Nizamabad from where its candidate Gaddam Ganga Reddy won thrice (1991, 1998 and 1999). Similarly, TDP’s Gutha Sukhender Reddy emerged victorious in Nalgonda in 1999. However, TDP has never won from Mabubnagar, Mahabubabad, Bhongir and Chevella.