Six days after he quit the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS), sitting Malkajgiri MLA Mynampally Hanumanth Rao formally joined the Congress party on Thursday, September 28 in Delhi. The legislator jumped ship after his demand to allocate the Medak seat to his son Rohith Reddy was ignored by the BRS supremo and Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao (KCR). Along with him, former BRS MLA Vemula Veeresham and Kumbam Anil Kumar Reddy, also joined the Congress party. Anil Kumar defected to the BRS two months ago.
While Mynampally Hanumanth Rao joining the Congress was expected, Anil Kumar returning to the Congress is an interesting development and a blow to the BRS which managed to poach him earlier. Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee president Revanth Reddy reportedly managed to bring him back after promising him a party ticket from the Bhongir seat. Anil Kumar was the Congress district committee chairman for Yadadri.
KCR had announced names for 115 seats in August for the Telangana state elections which are slated to be held in December. The BRS supremo himself will be contesting from two seats - Gajwel (current) and Kamareddy. While Hanumanth Rao’s name featured in the list as the candidate for the Malkajgiri seat, the MLA had been demanding the BRS leadership to give a ticket to his son to contest from Medak constituency. The Medak seat was instead given to Padma Devender Reddy.
Former BRS minister Tummala Nageshwar Rao had also joined the Congress recently after being denied a ticket by KCR. All of those who have been snubbed or feel that they are being sidelined by the BRS are tilting towards the Congress. Interestingly, the disgruntled leaders have not preferred to join the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
In the upcoming election, the BRS will be looking to win a hat-trick, while the Congress is hoping to bank on anti-incumbency and win. In the 2018 state polls, the BRS won 88 out of 119 seats and stormed to power. The Congress, which formed a grand alliance with the Telugu Desam Party and other organisations, managed to win just 19 seats - two less than its 2014 tally of 21. It suffered a bigger setback when 12 of its MLAs subsequently defected to the BRS.