With the Telangana Assembly Election 2023 less than a month away, political parties are busy forming new allies, while calling off the older ones at the same time. The election is likely to be a contest between the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS), the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Here’s what all the political parties are up to in the poll-bound state:

Support for Congress: The Telangana Jana Samithi (TJS) party has extended its “unconditional support to the Congress” in the upcoming state assembly elections, the Congress was quoted by ANI as saying.

Besides, the president of YSR Telangana Party, YS Sharmila Reddy, also said on Friday, November 3, that her party will support the Congress in the Telangana Assembly election. “The YSRTP will not contest this election,” she was quoted by ANI as saying.

In the 2018 Telangana polls, the Congress had announced a pre-poll alliance of four parties. The Congress-led People’s Front (Praja Kutami) included the Telugu Desam Party (TDP), the Communist Party of India (CPI) and the Telangana Jana Samithi (TJS).

The Telangana unit of the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) decided not to contest the November 30 assembly polls. TDP sources cited the recent arrest of party chief N Chandrababu Naidu as the reason for their absence. The TDP is yet to voice its support for any other party in the fray.

The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI(M)) called off its proposed alliance with the Congress on November 2 and announced a list of 17 constituencies it will contest from in the November 30 Telangana Assembly elections, the News Minute reported on Thursday.

The report added that the decision to call off the alliance with the Congress came after the latter failed to give the CPI(M) two seats out of a list of five that it had suggested.

4. Amid this, CPI(M) leaders were quoted by the News Minute as saying that if the Communist Party of India (CPI) is willing, they will contest the polls together.

The BJP and the Jana Sena Party (JSP) are hoping to forge an alliance. The two parties reportedly initiated seat-sharing talks in October. The India Express reported on October 27 that actor-turned-politician K Pawan Kalyan, who heads the JSP, had also met Union Home Minister Amit Shah earlier.

In 2018, the BJP denied any tie-up with any party and went solo.

The BRS is contesting the Telangana polls on its own. However, AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi was quoted by PTI as saying that he has already made an appeal to the people to vote for AIMIM candidates wherever they contest and to the BRS in the remaining seats.

Overall 2018 Telangana poll results

In the 2018 Telangana elections, the ruling BRS won 88 out of 119 seats. The Congress won 19 seats, while the Left parties drew a blank. The BJP had won only one seat, the TDP two seats and the AIMIM seven seats.

The 119-member Telangana assembly will go to polls on November 30, 2023, the Election Commission of India (ECI) declared. The date of counting is December 3.