Blow to BRS as two MPs, an MLA join Congress

The Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) suffered a massive jolt on Sunday when two of its MPs — Pasunuri Dayakar from Warangal and G Ranjith Reddy from Chevella — and Khairatabad MLA D Nagender resigned in a span of a few hours and joined the ruling Congress in Telangana.
Earlier, three other sitting Lok Sabha MPs had quit the BRS – Venkatesh Netha from Peddapalli, Pothuganti Ramulu from Nagarkurnool and B B Patil from Zaheerabad. While Netha joined the Congress party, Ramulu and Patil joined the Bharatiya Janata Party.
In his resignation letter addressed to BRS president and former chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, the Chevella MP said he was quitting the primary membership of the party due to personal reasons.
“Unfortunately, due to the current political circumstances in the state of Telangana, I have come to the difficult decision to pursue an alternative path. It is with a heavy heart that I hereby submit my resignation from the BRS Party and relinquish my membership,” he said.
Ranjith Reddy expressed his heartfelt gratitude for the invaluable opportunity provided by the BRS to address and resolve the crucial issues affecting the residents of the former Ranga Reddy and Vikarabad districts.
“Your confidence in my abilities has empowered me to effectively serve the constituents of Chevella, my parliamentary constituency. I am sincerely thankful for your steadfast support throughout this journey. I want to extend my deepest appreciation for the support and endorsement extended by the Party during my tenure,” he said.
Nagender, however, did not submit any resignation letter to the party. But, he, along with Reddy, went to the residence of PCC president and chief minister A Revanth Reddy and joined the Congress. AICC in-charge of Telangana affairs Deepa Das Munshi welcomed both of them into the party by offering them Congress scarfs.
On Saturday evening, Warangal MP Dayakar resigned from the BRS and joined the Congress in the presence of the chief minister at the latter’s residence. He was apparently peeved with the denial of party ticket in the present general elections – the party has fielded Kadiyam Kavya, daughter of BRS lawmaker Kadiyam Srihari, from Warangal parliamentary constituency.
On other hand, Nagender is the first BRS MLA to join Congress party after the latter came to power. It was a sort of homecoming for Nagender, who had served as a minister in the Congress government in united Andhra Pradesh from 2009 to 2014.
He had joined TRS (now BRS) in 2018 and was elected to the assembly from Khairatabad. He retained the seat in the recent elections.
The BRS, which lost power to Congress after ruling the state for 10 years, had won 39 seats in the 119-member Assembly.
A Congress leader familiar with the development said several BRS legislators are evincing interest in joining the ruling party. Some of them, including Malkajgiri MLA Ch Malla Reddy, Kotha Prabhakar Reddy from Dubbak, Sunitha Laxma Reddy from Narsapur, G Mahipal Reddy from Patancheru, K Manik Rao from Zaheerabad, Tellam Venkat Rao from Bhadrachalam, Prakash Goud from Rajendra Nagar and Kale Yadaiah from Chevella have already met the chief minister over the last two months in the name of discussing constituency issues.
Former MP and present chairman of Telangana state legislative council Gutha Sukhender Reddy along with his son Amit Reddy met Revanth Reddy a few days ago, signalling his probable defection to the Congress, the party leader quoted above said.