Konda Vishweshwar Reddy, who is fondly called KVR by his followers comes from an illustrious family. A tech entrepreneur who studied and worked in the US, Vishweshwar Reddy returned to India and joined politics in 2013. While he won on a BRS ticket from Chevella Lok Sabha segment in 2014 polls, later he joined Congress and then lost the election from the same segment to the then BRS candidate Dr G Ranjit Reddy in 2019 polls.
Now, he is contesting from Chevella on a BJP nomination and hoping to win the election with a landslide margin of votes. In an interview with DH's SNV Sudhir, the BJP candidate says, Congress leaders should get the power hangover out of their minds and see the reality as voters are shifting to BJP.
You have undertaken Praja Ashirvada Yatra across your constituency. So, what was the mood among the public? What have you seen?
See, the last assembly elections for the BJP were highly skewed, the results, in the sense. In urban areas, we got a huge voting percentage, which was 30 plus, whereas in rural areas, we got a very, very small vote share. In some cases less than 10 per cent. So, generally perceived for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, our weak spot is rural. But my vote in the last two MP elections, my weak spot was city, my strength was rural. And, in rural areas, I'm highly connected because I have relatives everywhere and I did a lot of work in rural areas and I'm well recognised there.
The yatra was not for asking for votes, but before I filed my nomination, I wanted the Ashirvada (Blessings), and then continued. And, I want to tell everyone, I'm the candidate, I want your blessing. My idea was to have small meetings in every village, meetings means just speak to them, ask their blessings, go on. Not big meetings. But the meetings became bigger and bigger. In some villages more than 1000 turned up. We wanted 200 people in the Rachabanda in the village. But more than that, by the fourth day, joinings started happening. So our target was to cover 370 villages and at the end of the yatra we covered more than that. We covered an average 1600 kilometers, which is the distance from here to the parliament.
Last time you lost to a BRS candidate, G Ranjit Reddy, and you were again pitted against the same candidate but from a different party. So what are your winning chances? What are your strengths against your opponent?
My survey and ten other surveys, including the one by Congress, shows that I'm winning by a huge margin. I think in every aspect, my accessibility, availability, and recognition among voters are all my strengths. And, the works I've done, works I got from the center, how I used my MPLADS and how I used my personal funds and my projects, which were my passion are all addons. Even before I joined politics, I promoted rural tourism and rural youth training in my constituency. I have done a lot of work during Covid.
From creating awareness about Covid to making sanitizers and alternative face masks at home to converting youth clubs into isolation centres, I have done good work during Covid. I converted all the bathroom cleaning trucks into disinfected spraying trucks and they moved around all the villages. I visited every village in the last few years and make it a point to visit them often. I visit the houses of sarpanches regularly to talk as they are the first touch points of people at grassroots. I also got a national highway sanctioned in my segment, and also reduced GST on Tandoor stone. These are all my strengths.
Who is your opponent? A Congress candidate or a BRS candidate as it looks like a three corner fight in Chevella.
I think it's a two corner fight between BJP and the Congress. Even after announcing his candidature, Ranjit Reddy ditched KCR and joined Congress. He also tried his best to join BJP and lobbied his best in Delhi. Since there was no response at all from BJP leaders, he had turned towards Congress. However, he lacks credibility and is not at all available to the people in the constituency. For the monetary resources he has Congress central leaders had admitted him against the wishes of state leadership.
Telangana CM A Revanth Reddy has been saying history will repeat and BJP will lose the same way that had happened in 2004, where your party had taken up the India Shining campaign. What's your take?
I cant blame Revanth Reddy. Nowadays, whatever the so called poll strategists were asking him to say he is telling that. Congress doesn't have guts to project their leader Rahul Gandhi as the prime ministerial candidate and such a party wants to target BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi who had done so much for the country. Revanth Reddy has made another comment that BRS and BJP had understanding in at least five segments to ensure the win of BJP candidates. That way he is actually admitting that Congress is losing the five seats. We don't have any understanding with any party.
The six guarantees they had announced, somehow helped the Congress in the assembly polls. They are all unviable freebies. That too they are unable to implement them. Except for free bus rides to women, the Congress government failed to implement other guarantees like enhancement of pension to Rs 4,000, Rs 2,500 monthly financial assistance to women, farm loan waiver and also Raithu Bandu. And the cruel joke of the free bus ticket is for instannec in my constituency, out of the 370 odd villages bus services are not available in 200 villages. That means they have a bus ticket but no bus to travel.
In the last year assembly elections, Congress had won decisively. Their leaders are confident that the same will be done and this will be repeated in these Parliament elections also. What's your take?
See, power is one of the greatest drugs. And one of the greatest occupational hazards in politics is, once we win, we lose touch of reality. They know for sure, I was in Congress once, they themselves admitted their vote share came down to less than 20 per cent. And they were losing every election, not just losing, they were losing their deposits. I mean, starting with Huzurabad everywhere, they were losing their deposits. GHMC, everywhere they were losing. Even in Munugode, they lost the deposit. And, then suddenly it went up. How from 20 per cent they became winning? The whole Telangana knows. The votes that Congress got are not Congress votes. The vote that Congress got is not out of love or trust in Congress. It is the anti-incumbency, to bury KCR. So, it's the Congress votes plus the 'bury KCR' votes. And those are the ones shifting in a massive way to BJP now. So, they'll have, they'll probably continue with their own vote share of 18-19 per cent. Ask them to shake them up. Wake up. Get that power hangover from your mind. Just open and see what happened.