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Telangana: BJP MP Threatens to Use 'Bombs and Knives' If Party Workers Are Attacked

Bandi Sanjay Kumar also accused Telangana CM K. Chandrasekhar Rao of "funding" rallies protesting the CAA and the NRC.

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New Delhi: A BJP MP from Telangana on Wednesday threatened to use “bombs and knives” to attack workers of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) and All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) if the saffron party’s workers are attacked with stones.

According to reports, Karimnagar MP Bandi Sanjay Kumar was reacting to an alleged instance of stones being thrown at a BJP rally in Hanmakonda city of Warangal earlier in the day. “If they use sticks to attack us, we will retaliate with knives and if knives are used, we will respond with guns. The war has already begun,” he said, according to the New Indian Express.

Kumar accused Telangana chief minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao of “funding” rallies protesting the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC). The BJP MP said that the Bill concerning CAA was passed after following all due procedures.

With local body elections around the corner, the BJP has been aggressively campaigning in the state. Last week, another BJP MP had threatened to “cut off” MIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi’s beard.

The saffron party is aiming to improve its political footprint in Telangana after a successful campaign in the general elections. The BJP won four of the 17 seats in the state, some of them in the TRS’s stronghold of north Telangana. With the Congress left weakened after many of its leaders defected to the ruling TRS, the saffron party is looking to become the main opposition in the state.