What is the biggest worry for the Congress in Telangana? It has a charismatic and fighting-fit leader like Revanth Reddy and he has the full backing of the high command. The state incharge of the party too is favourably inclined towards the TPCC chief. What more? The people of the state are unhappy with the TRS rule and the party is facing anti-incumbency.
But, despite all these favourable tidings, there is confusion, distrust and uncertainty in the TPCC. The reason? If party insiders are to be believed, the party suffers from coverts. These coverts occupy key positions at various levels starting from state to the village level. This was confirmed by a report by poll strategist Sunil Kanugolu and was backed by Prashant Kishor, who had a brief dalliance with the Congress, before parting company.
It may be recalled that even Rahul Gandhi recently talked about coverts in the Congress Party in Telangana. He said that these were passing sensitive information to the rivals and were thus foiling the plans of the party. More worrisomely for the party, till now only Congress coverts were there. Now, there are BJP coverts too. These people are in the Congress party but hobnob with the BJP leaders and pass out sensitive information to the BJP bosses.
The AICC list of coverts included some senior leaders of the party. Some leaders like Komatireddy Rajagopal Reddy and Konda Vishweswar Reddy are actually two-timing. Konda has links with both the BJP and the Congress leaders. Rajagopal Reddy is in the Congress, but sings the BJP tunes. Rahul Gandhi reportedly directed the TPCC leaders to ensure that leaders who are acting on BJP and TRS coverts be refused party tickets in 2023.
