Union home minister Amit Shah on Sunday promised to rid Hyderabad of the “nawab and nizam culture” if the BJP wins the municipal corporation elections.

Shah was in the southern city on Sunday to campaign for the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation polls, scheduled to be held on December 1. While canvassing on Saturday, Uttar Pradesh chief minister and Hindutva mascot Yogi Adityanath had backed the idea of renaming the IT hub as “Bhagyanagar”, boasting how he had undertaken a similar exercise in his state.

Shah and Adityanath are part of a steady stream of central BJP leaders who have trooped to Hyderabad to campaign for the local body elections, lobbing polarising topics such as Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Osama bin Laden, Bangladeshi and Rohingya refugees.

The BJP has made an unprecedented bid for the municipal corporation, eyeing the larger goal of getting a foothold in the southern state of Telangana.

Since Hyderabad, which has a 43.5 per cent Muslim population according to the 2011 Census, is the stronghold of AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi, who represents the Lok Sabha seat, the BJP has been seeking to target him to achieve its political motive in the state.

“I want to assure the people of Hyderabad that we will take steps to rid Hyderabad of the nawab and nizam culture and turn it into a mini-India,” Shah said, addressing the media after a road show in the city. “We want Hyderabad to give up the nizam culture and become a modern city,” the Union home minister added.

A day earlier, the saffron-clad Adityanath had said: “If we win, we will turn Hyderabad into Bhagyanagar…. Faizabad can be named Ayodhya, Allahabad is now Prayagraj, then why can’t Hyderabad be Bhagyanagar?”

While campaigning, BJP MP and youth wing chief Tejashwi Surya had called Owaisi an “avatar of Osama Bin Laden” and accused the local MP of bringing “Rohingya Muslims” to the city.

On Sunday, Shah too targeted Owaisi and his party. The BJP leader said the problem of water-logging in the city was due to the “appeasement” of “Majlis”, a reference to Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM), who Shah accused of promoting “illegal constructions”.

“If the BJP comes to power it will demolish all these illegal constructions,” Shah said.

The BJP smelt an opportunity in Telangana after its recent surprise victory in the Dubakka Assembly by-election. The party feels that Telangana, like Karnataka, could become another BJP bastion in the south where it has been struggling to gain a toehold. The BJP now has just two MLAs in Telangana. The decline of the Congress in the state has also encouraged the BJP to try to take over the space of the principal Opposition.

“We are already the principal Opposition and after the next election we will rule the state,” Shah said on Sunday, launching an attack on chief minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, who heads the TRS.

Shah took on KCR for his “undeclared alliance” with the “Majlis”.

“Why does he (KCR) not come out openly and declare his alliance with the Majlis?” Shah asked. He accused KCR of overlooking illegal constructions by the AIMIM due to “appeasement politics”.

The ruling TRS and the AIMIM dominate the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation. In the last polls, the TRS had won 99 and Owaisi’s AIMIM 44 of the 150 seats. The BJP had managed just four and the Congress two.

The TRS has often been friendly towards the BJP, backing the Centre on even controversial legislation in Parliament. The BJP, however, has now decided to train its guns on KCR in its bid to emerge as a challenger, replacing the Congress.

Shah accused KCR of remaining cooped up in his “farm house” and neglecting governance, claiming that this would help the BJP to rise in Telangana.