Hyderabad: In a major setback to the Opposition Congress in poll-bound Telangana, senior leader and former minister, Ponnala Lakshmaiah quit the party on Friday. A prominent BC leader with over four decades of association with the Congress party, Lakshmaiah in the resignation letter to AICC president Mallikharjuna Kharge said he cannot stand the unjust environment currently prevailing in the party.
He blamed party leadership for not giving importance to senior leaders, citing it was frustrating to wait for 10 days to meet party general secretary K C Venugopal to discuss some concerns.
The former minister also found fault with the surveys being conducted by a single person to pick the candidates to fight the polls. He further said it was unfortunate that a group of 50 BC leaders who wanted priority in tickets were denied a meeting with the party leadership, which shows the state of affairs.
Lakshmaiah is likely to join the ruling BRS though it was not immediately confirmed by either side. He is also likely to contest from the Janagaon segment on the ruling party ticket. Interestingly, Janagoan was one of the four segments for which BRS supremo and Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao had not announced candidates. KCR in August itself had announced candidates for 115 of the 119 seats in the Telangana Assembly.
A four-time MLA Lakshmaiah, belonging to Munnuru Kapu, a numerically significant caste group, has been winning Janagaon since 1989. However, he lost in 2014 and 2019 polls. He was the first PCC president of Telangana following the bifurcation of the state.
Published 13 October 2023, 22:47 IST