HYDERABAD: By the time the sun began setting on Wednesday, Deputy Chief Minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka was on his way to Bengaluru, where AICC president Mallikarjun Kharge was also present and a meeting between the two was expected.
Officially, there was little politics attached to the trip — Vikramarka was to visit the Devadurga gold mine in Karnataka along with Singareni officials. But the timing of the journey, coming after a meeting with Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy and earlier in the day with former MLC Konda Murali, gave the trip a different political reading within the Telangana Congress.
The question doing the rounds in party circles was simple: had the Konda Surekha episode found its way into a conversation with the Congress high command?
The speculation gained ground because the party’s Disciplinary Action Committee, headed by Mallu Ravi, had submitted its report on the controversy involving Surekha and Telangana Planning Board Vice-Chairman G Chinna Reddy a day earlier. The report is understood to have recommended action against Surekha, including her removal from the Cabinet, leaving the next move with the party leadership.
Murali’s meeting with Vikramarka at Praja Bhavan therefore acquired a relevance beyond the stated reason for the meeting. Murali sought his intervention and is understood to have placed their position before the deputy chief minister.
I don’t know Sushmita’s plan B, says Murali
The Vikramarka camp, however, maintained that the meeting concerned pending bills. That explanation may account for the meeting itself, but it did little to quieten speculation about what followed.
Vikramarka soon after met Revanth before leaving for Bengaluru, setting off speculation over whether he might be drawn into a mediatory role in the dispute.
There is, after all, little room for coincidence in party politics when several pieces fall into place at once.
What Vikramarka might tell the high command, if he meets Kharge, is now the subject of discussion among ministers and MLAs. One possibility is that he could convey the case for disciplinary action in line with the DAC report. Another is that he could favour bringing the two sides together and finding a way to settle the dispute within the party.
The uncertainty is compounded by the fact that Surekha herself met Kharge a day before the DAC submitted its report. If Vikramarka now meets the AICC president, the sequence has naturally invited questions about whether the leadership is preparing to take a decision or is still looking for a way out of the impasse.
Uncertainty over status
There is also uncertainty over the precise status of the DAC report. Congress leaders are asking whether it has already reached the high command and whether TPCC president Mahesh Kumar Goud has forwarded it with his own assessment.
Some within the party believe that merely transmitting the committee’s findings may not be enough and that the TPCC president should also communicate his view on the dispute. Attempts to contact Mahesh Goud for a response were unsuccessful. Another part of the equation is AICC Telangana in-charge Meenakshi Natarajan. Party leaders are watching how she approaches a disciplinary matter involving a BC leader, Chinna Reddy, and a woman minister, Surekha. The political handling of the case is therefore likely to matter as much as the disciplinary recommendation itself.
For the Surekha camp, the immediate effort appears to be to prevent the dispute from becoming a question of political separation from the Congress.
Speaking to reporters after meeting Vikramarka, Murali said the response to the disciplinary notice had already been submitted and that the couple intended to remain in the Congress. He also sought to separate the family from remarks made by their daughter, Konda Sushmita, against Revanth.
“We have already given our reply to the disciplinary committee after the notice was served on Konda Surekha. Whatever we wanted to say, we have said. We will continue in the Congress. We have full confidence in the Gandhi family. Susmitha might have spoken with Plan A, but I don’t know what her Plan B is. You have seen that KCR’s daughter also left the BRS earlier,” he said.
Vikramarka, according to party sources, told Murali that the high command was seriously concerned about the developments and made it clear that the matter was now before the party leadership and was not in his hands.
‘Surekha issue not discussed’
Meanwhile, Congress MLA Komatireddy Rajgopal Reddy also met Vikramarka on Wednesday. Rajgopal Reddy said the meeting was confined to pending bills relating to development works in his constituency and that he had not discussed the Surekha controversy.
Asked about his earlier comments on the government and party affairs, he said he had not spoken against the chief minister or the Congress.
“I have spoken only for the welfare of hardworking party workers and to strengthen the party. I have never made statements that would weaken the party,” he said, adding that Congress leaders shared the objective of working together to make Rahul Gandhi the Prime Minister.
He reiterated that he would abide by any decision taken by the high command on party discipline.
For now, the Congress has a report on the table, a minister facing a possible disciplinary decision and a leadership that has yet to reveal its hand. Whether Vikramarka’s Bengaluru trip remains a mining visit or becomes part of the political process around the Konda Surekha dispute may become clearer after the conversations in Bengaluru.