HYDERABAD: Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee president K. Keshava Rao has made light of the Telugu Desam Party's performance in panchayat raj elections claiming that the Congress has secured more than 80 per cent of zilla parishads on the expected lines.

The loss of a couple of zilla parishads to the TDP notwithstanding, the PCC president says that the Congress has not lost anything substantial while what the TDP has secured is inconsequential.

Poll rhetoric

The Congress is on course to secure two-thirds of the ZPTCs too. When reminded about the Congress party's claim that the TDP will not reach a double-digit tally of ZPTCs in any district, he says that it is poll rhetoric to make party leaders and cadre "fighting fit."

Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Dr. Rao said that except for few districts in Telangana, the Congress had won with big margins throughout the State despite the "dark designs" and campaign by the Opposition against the ruling party.

Cases filed in courts before the elections and the media's projection of irregularities had created confusion among people, but the party was poised to secure more than 80 per cent of the ZPs.

To a question, he said separate Telangana was not an issue in the elections and the Congress may have lost some seats because of friendly contests with the Telangana Rashtra Samiti, but, "we are not prepared to blame our allies."

The Congress viewed the TRS as a movement and the TRS, on its part, did not take up any measures to strengthen its organisational capabilities at the grass root level in the past two years.

On the CPI (M) distancing itself from the Congress, he said the party had to put in a lot of efforts to secure whatever it did while it could have won the same number of seats effortlessly had it gone with the Congress.

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