Adilabad: Local leaders gang up against NRI ticket aspirants

Adilabad: Local Congress and BRS leaders have ganged up against NRIs in allotment of party tickets in some assembly constituencies.

Perhaps it is for the first time that three senior Congress leaders, all aspiring to contest from Adilabad constituency in the forthcoming assembly general elections, applied for the party ticket on the same day at same time in Gandhi Bhavan.

The three leaders – DCC president Sajid Khan, TPCC state general secretary Gandrath Sujatha, and former Adilabad Market Committee chairman Sanjeeva Reddy – announced that they will work for the victory of the one who gets the Congress ticket from among them.

The three released a photograph in which they can be seen submitting their applications to TPCC working president Mahesh Kumar Goud at the Gandhi Bhavan.

As a group, the three are opposing allotment of Congress ticket from Adilabad to NRI Kandi Srinivas Reddy. They have appealed to the party's high command to give priority to local leaders working for the party since many years, instead of parachute leaders.

Incumbent BRS MLA from Khanapur Ajmeer Rekha Naik, who has been denied the party ticket, has raised her objection to nomination of the ticket to Bhukya Johnson Rathod Naik, an NRI and close friend of IT minister K.T. Rama Rao.

Rekha Naik termed Johnson Naik as an outsider and questioned his credentials as ST when his family had converted to Christianity.

Many Lambada leaders, including Purnachander Badhavath who claimed support of the MP Joginapalli Santhosh and former IAS officer Sharman Naik, had launched a campaign against both Johnson Naik and sitting MLA Rekha Naik, terming these leaders as outsiders. They have coined the slogan “Local leader ko bachavo… non-local leader ko hatao.”’.

Purnachander Badhavath and Sharman Naik have, however, gone silent just after Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao announced the party ticket for Johnson Naik. It is said things would have been different if the party had given a ticket to another community person (non-Naik) among the STs.

Local and non-local differences cropped up within BJP in Khanapur constituency during a party meeting held in Jannaram. Pembi BJP ZPTC Bhukya Janaki termed BJP senior leader and former Adilabad MP Rathod Ramesh as non-local. Both these leaders are indulging in verbal attacks against each other.