Keshava Rao quits BRS, in talks with Congress leadership before joining

Hyderabad: Rajya Sabha MP and BRS senior leader K Keshava Rao quit the party on Friday. He would join the Congress party after discussing the strategies with the party leadership in New Delhi.

Earlier in the day, Keshava Rao called on chief minister Revanth Reddy at his residence and discussed plans to join the Congress. His daughter and Hyderabad mayor Gadwal Vijayalakshmi would join the Congress party in the presence of Revanth Reddy on Saturday.

Speaking to the media at his residence here on Friday, Keshava Rao said, “I served in the Congress for almost five-and-a-half decades in various capacities including party in-charge for four states. The Congress leadership made me a Central Working Committee (CWC) member. I am the first person to submit a letter to Sonia Gandhi with 40 MLAs in 1998 for a separate statehood to Telangana.”

Keshava Rao recalled that several Congress MPs from the State for Telangana and during the agitation for a separate statehood a proposal came to him to join the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (then TRS).

“Almost after 55 years, I joined the TRS in May 2013 and held various positions in the party. Telangana is created by a bill in the Parliament not by songs, dances or public meetings. Inspired by K Chandrashekhar Rao slogan ‘Rediscover Telangana,’ I joined the TRS,” he said.

‘KCR promised to merge TRS with Congress after state formation’

Commending the efforts of KCR for the holistic development of Telangana, the 85-year-old leader said that Telangana is one of the backward regions in the country as per the Planning Commission of India. However, KCR with his efforts made the State get on top in the country in GDP, power, per capita irrigation, power production and IT exports. “The entire credit should be given to KCR. However, even after making so much development, the BRS was defeated in the Assembly elections. It is very pathetic,” he said.

Keshava Rao further said that he met KCR on Thursday and informed him about his decision to quit the party. “KCR asked me not to quit the party. I think that my tour is completed and I am going back to my own Congress party. I will continue in the age-old party till my last breath,” he said and added that KCR promised Sonia Gandhi to merge the TRS into the Congress after the formation of Telangana. But he failed to keep up his promise.

The senior politician said that he attended Rajya Sabha sessions 64 times while he was in the Congress and from the BRS it was only 16 times he attended the sessions. “On several occasions, I asked KCR to join the INDIA alliance. But he never bothered my words,” he said. Rao also said that if the BRS served a whip on switching his loyalties to Congress from the BRS, he would answer it appropriately.