Why is Eatala forced to join BJP?

It is now more or less confirmed that senior Telangana Rashtra Samithi legislator and sacked state health minister Eatala Rajender is going to join the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Rajender, who left for New Delhi on Sunday evening, is going to meet BJP national president J P Nadda on Monday evening along with Union minister G Kishan Reddy and state BJP president Bandi Sanjay, who also flew to the national capital in the afternoon.

He might immediately join the BJP in the presence of Nadda or will formally do it after resigning from the TRS and also the assembly membership in a couple of days.

Along with him, another senior leader and ex-MLA Enugu Ravinder Reddy also would join the BJP.

One wonders why Rajender has taken so much time to take a decision to join the BJP. He met everybody – from the Left parties, the Congress and even the Telangana Jana Samithi and sought their support to his fight against the KCR oppression.

He even told the media that he was seeking support from every like-minded person and that he would contest the by-elections to Huzurabad as an independent. He had been telling the leaders of various parties whom he had met.

Every political party extended sympathy to Rajender, nobody was willing to support him as an independent. Former MP Konda Vishweshwar Reddy suggested that he should float a new political party and he would get support from all sections of people.

PCC working president Revanth Reddy reportedly told him that he would get the wholehearted support from the Congress, if he joined the party, but if he contests as an independent, the Congress would also be compelled to field its candidate.

Rajender received similar response from the BJP leaders as well. However, the BJP leaders gave an additional assurance that the Centre would give him protection from being arrested in the cases filed by the KCR government. They also reportedly gave him an offer of projecting him as the CM candidate, if necessary.

So, Rajender felt that there is no point in fighting the battle independently, as nobody would support him and it would finally benefit the TRS. After weighing all pros and cons, he found that the BJP offer is irresistible. That is why, he opted for the BJP, sources said.