Jolt to BRS, senior party leader will join Congress
Hyderabad (IANS). Ahead of the Telangana assembly elections, the ruling Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) was dealt another blow with senior leader and former mayor of Greater Hyderabad Tegala Krishna Reddy deciding to join the Congress along with his daughter-in-law Anitha Reddy.
Krishna Reddy and Anitha Reddy held a secret meeting with Telangana AICC in-charge Manikrao Thakre and state Congress chief A Revanth Reddy on Tuesday.
Both the BRS leaders are likely to join the Congress soon.
This will be the second blow to the BRS after former minister Jupalli Krishna Rao, former Khammam MP Ponguleti Srinivasa Reddy and 33 others quit the ruling party and joined the Congress last month.
It is believed that Krishna Reddy has taken this decision due to the possibility of not getting ticket from Maheshwaram constituency in the upcoming assembly elections.
The former MLA is unhappy as Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has reportedly decided to give BRS ticket from Maheshwaram to Education Minister P. Sabitha Indra Reddy. He contested the 2018 election as a Congress candidate against Krishna Reddy.
Krishna Reddy has been fuming ever since Sabitha Indra Reddy joined the TRS (now BRS) in 2019 along with some other Congress leaders and was denied a cabinet berth by KCR.
Krishna Reddy, who started his political journey with the Telugu Desam Party (TDP), served as the Mayor of Greater Hyderabad from 2002 to 2007. He was also the chairman of the Hyderabad Urban Development Authority (HUDA).
When the Maheshwaram constituency was created in 2009, he contested as a TDP candidate, but lost to Sabitha Indra Reddy.
Krishna Reddy said his detractors within the party were saying that since his daughter-in-law Anita Reddy is the Rangareddy Zilla Parishad president, his family would not get two posts.
Last year, Krishna Reddy had alleged that minister Sabitha Indira Reddy was promoting encroachment in Maheshwaram constituency. He criticized the minister for destroying the Meerpet Mantralaya lake. Asserting that he would not sit silent on the destruction of Meerpet, he had said that he would start an indefinite fast if necessary.
