SANGAREDDY: Harish Rao has been one of Telangana Rashtra Samithi’s most interesting personalities. Once considered party chief K Chandrasekhar Rao’s man Friday, and despite being eventually eclipsed by Rao’s son KT Rama Rao, Harish Rao has had a remarkable political career. And, according to the people of Siddipet, elections are but a formality to decide who they will send to represent them in the Legislative Assembly.
One can say Harish Rao’s political career started in 2004, at an age of 32, when he became the Minister for Youth Affairs in the Andhra Pradesh cabinet. Until then Rao was known to be his uncle K Chandrasekhar Rao’s point man in interior Telangana, where he was instrumental in building up momentum for the separate Statehood movement. That year, the Telangana Rashtra Samithi had joined hands with Congress and as part of this agreement KCR was given the Labour portfolio in the Union cabinet. To serve in the Union government, KCR had to resign as MLA from Siddipet (he was already elected as an MP from Karimnagar).
So who should KCR call to take his place in Siddipet, a region that had been loyal to his party in a time when it seemed the Telangana movement was fizzling out. The answer lay in Harish Rao, his nephew who he trusted and who coincidentally had to become an MLA or MLC within six months of taking oath as Minister.
In the by-polls held the same year, he fought Cheruku Muthyam Reddy, a TDP candidate, and win by 24,829 votes. He has managed to get reelected from the same constituency since then, and his vote margin has only increased with each election. In 2014 elections, Rao won by 93,328 votes more than Congress’ candidate Taduri Srinivas Goud. In total, he has won two by-elections and two general elections, and quite comfortably in all of them.
It was always clear that Harish Rao would have an important role in the first Telangana government. He was given the portfolios of Irrigation, Marketing and Legislative Affairs. Irrigation was arguably one of the most important ministries in the new government. During his time here, Rao spearheaded the Mission Kakatiya and Mission Bhagiratha programmes, both massive infrastructure development schemes related to water supply.
Favour to a fault
Harish Rao does not take Siddipet for granted — he has been known to spend five days of the week in the town. In fact, he has been accused of favouring Siddipet to a fault. He was accused by Sangareddy-based Congress leader Jagga Reddy of changing the location of the proposed medical college from Sangareddy to Siddipet. He was also accused of diverting water from irrigation projects in nearby regions to Siddipet.
Rao knows that his chances of winning Siddipet are quite good, so he has a new goal now - to win by a margin of 1 lakh votes. So he tells people attending his meetings, “Please make sure I win with 1 lakh margin.”
Many party leaders in the region say that other than party supremo K Chandrasekhar Rao himself, only Rao has the ability to unite the party. And, this ability will surely be tested in the coming weeks.