New Delhi: Amid a Parliament deadlock over the Manipur issue, Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge will review preparations for the 2024 national polls in the five southern states, which together send 129 members to the Lok Sabha. According to party leaders, Kharge will review Kerala on August 1, Karnataka on August 2 and Tamil Nadu on August 3 with the AICC and state teams. Later, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh leaders may also be invited.
The review sessions are in a series of meetings Kharge has started with respective state leaders to prepare the party for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. The focus on south India has been renewed after the Congress recently recorded a resounding victory in Karnataka, making the entire region BJP-free. Just after the Karnataka polls, Kharge had named state unit chief DK Shiv Kumar as the deputy chief minister, but also tasked him with ensuring a record haul of parliamentary seats in the state in 2024.
Karnataka sends 28 members to the Lok Sabha. Out of this, the BJP had swept the state with 25 seats, while Congress, JD-S and an independent candidate won one seat each. “This time, we want to win all 28 seats. Strategies for the same will be devised in time. The Congress guarantees changed the game in the Assembly polls and once these schemes start rolling smoothly, the voters will feel the change. The BJP stands exposed,” AICC secretary in charge of Karnataka Abhishek Dutt said.
Also read: Opposition parties vow to fight together in 2024; next meeting in Shimla
Party insiders said that Bengaluru had been chosen as the venue of the second opposition unity meeting on July 18 primarily to send out a strong message in south India. While Karnataka is the flavour of the season in the Congress, it was Kerala, which was the most promising state for the grand old party, which had won 19 out of the 20 Lok Sabha seats in the 2019 general elections.
Rahul Gandhi, who had contested the national polls from Wayanad, had won with a record margin. Rahul’s Bharat Jodo Yatra received an overwhelming response in Kerala last year and the former MP was recently in the state to pay tributes to party veteran Oommen Chandy, who passed away during the opposition meet in Bengaluru. “We will repeat the 2019 result next year,” AICC in charge of Kerala Tariq Anwar said.
Telangana, which was carved out of Andhra Pradesh in 2013, and the parent state need more attention from the Congress managers, who are trying hard to regain ground there. In 2019, BRS won nine out of a total of 17 Lok Sabha seats in Telangana while Congress had three, BJP four and AIMIM one seat. Kharge has already deployed AICC observers for all 17 parliamentary seats in Telangana to prepare ground reports, which will be used for the 2024 poll strategy.
In Andhra Pradesh, the YSRCP had won 22 of the total 25 Lok Sabha seats and continues to pose a challenge before the Congress. In Tamil Nadu, the DMK-Congress alliance swept the 2019 polls winning 38 of the total 39 Lok Sabha seats. The Congress had contested nine seats and won eight. As the alliance is going strong in the state, the Congress will work to strengthen the alliance while seeking more seats from the DMK.
