Tummala Nageswara Rao quits Telugu Desam
KCR may take Tummala into Cabinet, offer MLC post
By : DC Correspondent
Update: 2014-08-31 01:37 GMT
Hyderabad: In a major defection, engineered by Chief Minister and TRS president K. Chandrasekhar Rao, a majority of prominent Telugu Desam leaders from Khammam on Saturday quit their party. They have decided to join the TRS in the presence of Mr Rao on September 5. It was this newspaper, which first carried an item on former TD minister Tummala Nageswara Rao being wooed by Mr Rao being one of his best friends to join the TRS.
It is being rumoured Mr Rao almost decided to take Mr Nageswara Rao into his Cabinet and is likely to offer him an MLC post, which will fall vacant in March 2015. Mr Nageswara Rao, who met Mr Chandrasekhar Rao on Friday here, on Saturday went to Khammam and was closeted with his followers and then announced his decision to quit the TD, the party he served for three decades and was a minister in the late N.T. Rama Rao and Chandrababu Naidu’s Cabinets for more than 10 years.
Along with Mr Nageswara Rao, who was an unsuccessful TD Assembly candidate from Khammam in the recent general elections, zilla parishad chairperson Gadipalli Kavitha, TD MLC Balasani Laxminarayana, TD Khammam district president, Kond-abala Koteswara Rao, District Cooperative Central Bank president Movva Vijay Babu, District Cooperative Market Committee chairman Anjaiah and district TD youth President Naga Chandra Reddy also quit the party on Saturday.
In a one line letter addressed to TD president N. Chandrababu Naidu, Mr Nageswara Rao said, “I am resigning from the TD party, please accept.” Of the nine zilla parishads in Telangana state, the TD won only the Khammam ZP recently and with Saturday’s development the party is left with no one. In a related development, Congress MLA Kanakaiah from Yellendu Assembly in Khammam district also met Mr Chandrasekhar Rao on Friday and offered to be associated with the TRS.