Forgotten Kapu leader emerges

Hyderabad: Mr Mudragada Padmanabham, the forgotten Kapu leader has once again emerged as a key leader of the caste. The veteran leader was known for his rebellious activities and had earlier threatened to kill himself with a revolver in his house over the issue of Kapu reservations.

Mr Padmanabham has had a four-decade-long political career. He is a four-time MLA and one-time MP.

He was a minister in the Congress government led by Marri Chenna Reddy and was also minister in the TD government led by N.T. Rama Rao.

He started his political career as a Janata Party MLA in 1978 and switched over to the TD in 1982 and won the 1983 and 1985 polls from the Prathipadu Assembly constituency in East Godavari.

Mr Padmanabham later quit the NTR Cabinet and started Praja Rakshana Samiti and later his own Telugu Nadu Party with leaders K.E. Krishna Murthy and K. Jana Reddy.

In 1988 he joined the Congress in the presence of Rajiv Gandhi at Prathipadu and was elected as MLA and held a ministerial berth. He was defeated in 1994 and joined BJP before going back to the Telugu Desam again.

In 1999, he represented the Telugu Desam in the Lok Sabha from the same seat but lost in the 2004 polls. In 2009, he joined the Congress and lost the election from Pithapuram.

Later he shifted to YSRC and participated in Mr Jagan Mohan Reddy’s Odarpu Yatra after YSR’s death. After going into political hibernation, he recently took up the Kapu reservation agitation.

The leader has been criticising AP Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu on the Kapu reservation issue for not implementing his poll promise. For this he will be able to garner the support of YSR Congress and the Congress.