Why BJP shunted out Bandi Sanjay Kumar in Telangana

The Bharatiya Janata Party's decision to replace its Telangana president Bandi Sanjay Kumar with Union minister G Kishan Reddy, a "softer" leader who can take everyone along, and elevate Etela Rajender, who has switched from the BRS, as its election management committee chairperson hints at a change in the party's strategy in the state.

Many state leaders, especially those sympathetic to Kumar, are keeping their fingers crossed to see if the party maintains its aggression or tones it down towards Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao-led Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) as the Congress seeks to rally forces to reclaim some of its lost ground in the state.

Kumar was in Delhi to meet BJP national president J P Nadda on Tuesday. Sources close to him added that he has been particularly peeved with the appointment of Rajender, a regional satrap who in 2021 quit the BRS, then known as Telangana Rashtra Samithi, to join the BJP.

A staunch ideologue, Kumar has had a trust deficit with Rajender, who is far from a hardcore Hindutva proponent, and some other leaders who have joined the BJP from other parties.

After notching up a creditable performance in the 2020 Hyderabad municipal polls and winning a few key assembly bypolls under his leadership, the BJP seems to have hit some roadblocks due to factionalism and the BRS and, lately, the Congress also stepping up their campaigns.

A senior national leader said the party needed a leader who could keep the organisation united and take along everyone. A softer and more sober Reddy, who has headed the party in Telangana earlier too, fits the bill, he said, noting that the Union minister has also been a committed BJP leader for decades.

Rajender's elevation will be seen as a positive signal to satraps from other parties who are keen to change sides, he said. A fall in the number of other party leaders joining the BJP was flagged in a recent meeting, sources said.

A combative leader with a knack for controversial digs at his rivals, Lok Sabha MP Kumar was credited by the party for infusing new energy in its ranks after taking over its leadership in 2020, as he took on the Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao-led BRS through his episodic foot-march across the state.

However, his rivals asserted that his campaign underpinned by hardcore ideological warfare was ill-suited for much of Telangana and that he was not capable of building on the organisation.

With the BJP opting for a change in Telangana while preparing to face the BRS and the Congress in assembly polls later this year, it remains to be seen what tactics the party deploys in the state which it eyes for its future growth.