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'United Front-type' govt backed by Congress only likelihood: TRS MP

B. Vinod Kumar claims the Congress won't reach 130 seats and BJP won't cross 170

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan (left) welcoming his Telangana counterpart K. Chandrashekar Rao | Facebook account of K. Chandrashekar Rao

A 'United Front-type' government of regional parties supported by the Congress is the "only likelihood" after the ongoing Lok Sabha elections, a key TRS leader said on Tuesday.

B. Vinod Kumar, sitting Lok Sabha member from Karimnagar and a confidant of TRS president and Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao, claimed that regional parties would win more seats than the BJP-led NDA or Congress-led UPA.

"United Front experiment was... Congress supporting from outside. This time also, there is every likelihood of such a proposition. No doubt," Kumar, the deputy floor leader of TRS in Lok Sabha, told PTI.

On his assessment of the Lok Sabha election results, Kumar said, "Congress crossing 100 (seats) and reaching 120-130 will be a herculean task for them (Congress). And BJP definitely not more than 170 (seats)".

According to Kumar, the idea of United Front "surfaced" after the election results in 1996, but "now I hope that even before the results (on May 23), that talk is on".

"I think that (a UF government with Congress supporting from outside) is the only likelihood," Kumar said.

The TRS had been pitching the idea of a non-Congress, non-BJP federal front of regional parties for several months now.

Chandrashekar Rao met his Kerala counterpart, Pinarayi Vijayan of the CPI(M), on Monday in Thiruvananthapuram, as part of his outreach to opposition parties. Kumar had accompanied him.

Rao's daughter and sitting Nizamabad Lok Sabha member K. Kavitha told PTI recently that regional parties may hold the key to government formation.

She had said the TRS is in touch with various parties not part of the NDA and UPA on its efforts to forge a federal front of regional outfits.

A federal front would take good shape after the Lok Sabha election results are out, Kavitha had said.