When A. Revanth Reddy crisscrossed Telangana during the last Assembly elections, one promise rang loudest in homes, marketplaces, and self-help group meetings: direct monthly financial assistance of ₹3,000 for women. It was a pledge wrapped in empathy and empowerment, pitched as a lifeline for households battling inflation and rising costs. For lakhs of women, it wasn’t just a political slogan—it was hope.
Months later, that hope has curdled into disappointment.
Instead of delivering on a core electoral assurance, the Congress government has chosen a familiar escape route: the treasury is empty. The Chief Minister now claims he inherited a “bankrupt” state, conveniently overlooking the fiscal projections, budget statements, and revenue streams that were publicly available even before the elections. If the finances were truly so dire, why promise the moon in the first place? This is not just about one unkept promise. It is about credibility.
For working women, homemakers, and SHG members who planned their household budgets around the promised assistance, the reversal feels like betrayal. Telangana has one of the largest networks of women’s Self-Help Groups in the country, built painstakingly over decades. These groups depend not just on microcredit and revolving funds, but on the confidence that the state stands behind women’s economic participation. Yet, reports from the ground suggest delays in fund releases, reduced support for capacity-building programmes, and uncertainty around subsidies and interest subvention schemes that once helped SHGs expand small enterprises. While the government blames financial stress, women are left counting the cost.
Contrast this with the record of women-centric governance at the national level. Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, women’s empowerment has moved from rhetoric to structured delivery. The Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana has provided LPG connections to over 9 crore households, sparing women the health hazards of smoky kitchens. The PM Awas Yojana has ensured that millions of homes are registered in the name of women, giving them legal ownership and security. Jan Dhan accounts, with more than 25 crore women beneficiaries, have brought financial inclusion to doorsteps that banks never reached before. Schemes like PM Mudra Yojana have extended collateral-free loans, allowing women entrepreneurs to scale small businesses into sustainable livelihoods.
These are not promises hanging in the air. These are policies that show up in bank passbooks, gas cylinders, land records, and business registrations.
In Telangana, the Congress government’s shifting narrative—from grand assurances to fiscal helplessness—raises a larger question. If electoral promises to women can be diluted within months of assuming office, what guarantee is there that future commitments will be honoured? Civic body elections, especially the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) polls, offer women voters a chance to answer that question at the ballot box.
The BJP’s performance in the last GHMC elections—where it emerged as a formidable opposition with 44 corporators—signalled a growing urban appetite for accountable governance. Now, with the incorporation of several municipalities into the GHMC, the total strength of the Corporation is set to expand from 150 to nearly 300 corporators, almost doubling its political and administrative footprint.
My party, which has already penetrated deep into rural villages that have now been brought under the GHMC’s jurisdiction, is well-positioned to convert this grassroots presence into electoral dominance. The potential is real: to emerge as the single largest party in the expanded Corporation.
My appeal, especially to women voters across GHMC limits, is clear—vote for a party and leadership genuinely wedded to women’s welfare, so that the promise of governance translates into tangible outcomes.
The goal, therefore, is not merely to cross the 170–180 seat mark, but to aim even higher—towards a decisive mandate that enables administrative efficiency, transparency, and truly citizen-focused delivery in a nearly 300-member municipal body.
For women, local governance matters deeply. It shapes the quality of sanitation, street lighting, water supply, public safety, anganwadis, and health services—the everyday realities that define dignity and security in a city. This is not a call rooted in party loyalty. It is a call rooted in lived experience.
Telangana’s women were promised empowerment, not explanations. They were offered assurance, not austerity. If promises can be postponed indefinitely, then accountability must begin somewhere. The GHMC polls provide that opportunity.
Empowerment is not measured by speeches on a campaign stage. It is measured by what reaches a woman’s home, her account, her enterprise, and her street. This election, let women choose the politics of delivery over the politics of delay—and send a clear message that trust, once broken, must be earned back, not taken for granted. She also hoped that the party would find competent women to get opportunity to fight the polls, as part of the Prime Minister’s women empowerment commitment. (The author is a member of BJP party)
