AA Edit | Setback for BRS, gain for Cong

On the day Prime Minister Narendra Modi was conducting a mammoth roadshow in Hyderabad sleuths of the Enforcement Directorate raided the residence of K. Kavitha, BRS MLC and daughter of former chief minister of Telangana, K. Chandrashekar Rao, and arrested her in the Delhi liquor scam.

Based on the statements of several alleged partners and accomplices who turned approver, the ED closed in for the kill, and brought her to the national capital for further questioning. She was later remanded in a week of judicial custody.

Ever since it first broke out in Delhi, the news of the case and the alleged scam has had huge political consequences in both the Telugu states, but predominantly in Telangana.

All parties have since been making allegations and counter-allegations, with the BJP state unit using the case as a way to portray both the Congress and the BRS as corrupt and nepotist parties. But the BJP leaders in Telangana suffered a setback in the Assembly polls held last November. The Congress had successfully argued that she was targeted not because the BJP and BRS were in cahoots but clandestinely.

The BRS tried to dub it as a conspiracy without much success. Its various leaders had dared the BJP and ED to arrest her if they had any proof.

Interestingly, the case is primarily against the state government of Delhi, in which several of the top Aam Aadmi Party leaders are also named. The AAP has, meanwhile, forged a partnership with the Congress as part of the INDIA alliance.

The BRS is down after a terrible trouncing and its attempts to politicise the arrest has not yielded any response. There is no immediate sympathy wave for the party after the arrest.

The BJP might now claim victory but the Congress hopes a divided BRS vote bank will give it the upper hand in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.