BRS Serilingampally MLA Arekapudi Gandhi joins Congress; becomes 9th leader to leave KCR
Gandhi is the ninth MLA from the BRS to join the Congress.
By Sistla Dakshina Murthy Published on 13 July 2024 6:39 AM GMT
Hyderabad: Another Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) MLA jumped ship and joined the ruling Congress on Saturday.
BRS MLA from Serilingampally constituency Arekapudi Gandhi joined the Congress at the Jubilee Hills residence of Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy.
Gandhi is the ninth MLA from the BRS to join the Congress. Along with Gandhi, a few corporators-- Nagender Yadav (Serlingampally), Uppalpati Srikanth (Miyapur), Manjula Raghunath Reddy (Chandanagar), Narne Srinivas (Hydernagar) and others also joined the ruling party.
A total of 26 BRS elected MLAs to join the Congress most of them reached an understanding before Loksabha Elections 2024 and have planned their exit accordingly.
Revanth Reddy welcomed the corporators with the party scarves. On Friday, Rajendra Nagar MLA Prakash Goud joined the Congress in the presence of Revanth Reddy.
A week ago, Prakash Goud and Arekapudi Gandhi met Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Nara Chandrababu Naidu at NTR Bhavan in Hyderabad during his visit to the city.
Congress won 64 seats in the 119-member Assembly in the elections that took place on November 30, 2023, taking power away from BRS. With the new defections, the Congress strength in the Telangana Legislative Assembly reached 73.
The BRS won 39 seats and their strength is now reduced to 30. Earlier, Kadiyam Srihari (Ghanpur Station) Danam Nagender (Khairatabad) Tellam Venkat Rao (Bhadrachalam), Pocharam Srinivas Reddy (Banswada) M Sanjay Kumar (Jagtial), Kale Yadaiah- (Chevella), Bandla Krishna Mohan Reddy (Gadwal) and Prakash Goud (Rajendra Nagar) joined the Congress from the BRS.
"Only three or four MLAs are likely to stay in the BRS party and all the others will join the Congress in the next few days," said Khairtabad MLA Danam Nagender.
Nagender also claimed that during the BRS's rule, the party's working president, KT Rama Rao (KTR) rarely made appointments for MLAs, and even when he did, the MLAs had to wait for hours.
"KTR operated the BRS office much like a corporate company. All the BRS MLAs were excited to join the Congress because, in contrast to BRS, the party gives freedom and self-respect," the Khairatabad MLA said.
