hyderabad
A day after its legislator (MLA) from Khairatabad Danam Nagender switching loyalties to the ruling Congress party, the Bharat Rasthra Samithi (BRS) has formally lodged a petition with Assembly Speaker Gaddam Prasad Kumar seeking the disqualification of the former.
A delegation of the BRS comprising MLAs Kaleru Venkatesh Yadav, Mutha Gopal, Padi Kaushik Reddy and Bandari Laxma Reddy and others went to the residence of the Speaker in the MLAs’ Quarters after taking prior appointment and submitted a petition seeking the disqualification of Mr. Nagender.
Speaking after meeting the Speaker, Mr. Kaushik Reddy said the Speaker had assured to examine the petition and take necessary action. The BRS MLA said keeping such petitions on hold was not possible now following a recent judgement of the Supreme Court in which the Apex Court had suggested the heads of the legislative bodies to dispose of such petitions within three months after receiving petition from the party concerned.
Mr. Kaushik Reddy mentioned that it was Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy, in his capacity as the Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) chief in the past, had stated that those who shift loyalties to another party after getting elected on the ticket of one party should be stoned to death. The BRS would not believe in such action but would believe in the constitutional systems in the country.
Further, it was Mr. Revanth Reddy who had said in the past that Mr. Nagender used to sell beedies in front of a bar in the Khairatabad chowrasta before taking to politics and sought to know from the former why he had purchased a beedi seller now and whether he (Mr. Nagender) would be made to sell beedies in front of Gandhi Bhavan, the State headquarters of Congress party, now.
Responding to a question, he said the BRS leaders had never spoken about toppling the Congress Government in the State but it was Mr. Revanth Reddy and few other leaders of the ruling party themselves were speaking about repeatedly exhibiting their insecurity complex. The BRS would do nothing but it would be the “Nalgonda or Khammam bombs within the Congress” that would destabilise the Revanth Reddy Government.
Mr. Nagender was with the Congress and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) in the past and in 2018 he quit as the Greater Hyderabad Congress unit president and joined BRS and was elected to the Assembly twice on the BRS ticket in 2018 and 2023. Before 2004 Assembly elections in the combined Andhra Pradesh, he quit the Congress after being denied ticket and joined TDP to win that election from Asifnagar. But, as the TDP had lost that election, he switched loyalties again to the Congress and was defeated in the by-election.
