Telangana Congress Chief Takes Pot-shots at BJP, Says Its Lawmakers are 'New Beggars'

Hyderabad: Telangana Congress working president and former MP Ponnam Prabhakar on Friday took a dig at the BJP, describing them as "new beggars" ahead of civic body polls in the state. The lawmaker's response came after BJP chief K Lakshman remarked that the grand old party is in the ICU (intensive care unit) and that its office in Gandhi Bhavan here will soon be vacated and get a “to-let” board.

Prabhakar also claimed that both the BJP and Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) president K Chandrashekar Rao are "joint thieves" and the saffron party in the state is the B-team of the ruling TRS. He predicted that the BJP will close its office in the near future as it lacks public support.

Prabhakar likened the BJP leaders to "new beggars" and claimed the BJP-led regime at the Centre had failed to do anything for the development of Telangana.

The TRS through operation Akarsh had succeeded in merging a team of 12 Congress legislators into its fold, he said.

The BJP has started preparing for the upcoming polls in the state in 2023. Party chief and Union Minister Amit Shah had recently visited Telangana, where he launched a membership drive to induct 18 lakh members into the party.

While quoting the election tally, Prabhakar said that the BJP had managed to win only one MLA from 105 seats and could not win even six local body seats out of the 600 in the Zilla Parishad elections.