Modi, Shah to campaign in Telangana, Andhra Pradesh

Naveen S Garewal
Tribune News Service
Hyderabad, March 26

The BJP will be sending a galaxy of top national leaders to the two Telugu states to campaign for the 25 and 17 parliamentary constituencies in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.

The team will be led by none other than Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party national president Amit Shah.

The two aggressively campaigned during the December 2018 assembly elections, but the party won only one seat in Telangana.

Andhra Pradesh will have simultaneous elections for the 25 parliamentary and 175 assembly seats on April 11.

The list of other important BJP leaders to campaign in the Telugu heartland includes Union ministers Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari, Arun Jaitely, Sushma Swaraj, Nirmala Sitharaman, JP Nadda and Suresh Prabhu, according to state BJP leadership.

The names of these leaders figure in the list of campaigners submitted by the BJP to the Election Commission, party sources said on Tuesday.

The list also includes among others Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, other Union ministers Uma Bharati, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, Smriti Irani, BJP MP and renowned actress Hema Malini, party leaders Ram Madhav and Syed Shahnawaz Hussain.

The BJP had contested the 2014 Lok Sabha polls in alliance with the TDP and won the Secunderabad seat with state BJP president Bandaru Dattatreya emerging the victor.

However, the party has denied him the ticket and asked him to campaign instead.