KTR kicks off poll campaign, keeps MLAs on tenterhooks

Adilabad: IT and MA&UD minister K.T. Rama Rao kicked off the campaign for the upcoming Assembly elections with ‘Praja Asheervada Sabha’ held in Bellampalli where he reeled out the state government’s welfare schemes and development works and insisted on the need for Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao's leadership for the state on Monday.

Already the working president of the BRS has announced a few sitting MLAs as party candidates to be fielded in some Assembly and Parliament constituencies while attending the public meetings in Karimnagar, Warangal, and Mahbubnagar districts in the last 15 days and appealed to the people to elect them with the huge majority in the elections.

News is making rounds in political circles that Rama Rao was clearing the decks for some sitting BRS MLAs by announcing them as party candidates and giving them more elbow room to intensify their campaign much before their political opponents of other parties.

Against this backdrop, many sitting MLAs are looking forward to the arrival of KTR to address the public meeting so that the names of the local sitting MLAs may be announced from that meeting.    

It is learnt that some of the sitting MLAs of the erstwhile Adilabad district express their strong desire for KTRs' visit to their Assembly constituencies and lobby for the same.

Surprisingly, KTR did not announce the local MLA Durgam Chinnaiah’s name as the party candidate for the next elections during the Monday public meeting in Bellampalli as he did in the previous meetings. Rama Rao just told the crowd to elect good leaders without a second thought but without taking Chinnaiah’s name.

Though Rama Rao lauded Chinnaiah for his efforts towards the development of the constituency, he kept the announcement of the latter’s name as the party’s candidate close to his chest though many were expecting it to happen.

Meanwhile, flexies appeared that were put up by BJP at various places which read “Bye-bye Chinniah ... Goodbye Chinniah” and “You brought shame to the people of the Bellampalli constituency with your unethical acts”, with photos about the MLA that appeared in the media. In view of the minister’s tour, police took some of the opposition parties’ leaders in Bellampalli into preventive custody.