HYDERABAD: Against the backdrop of Centre once again considering the proposal to conduct simultaneous polls to Lok Sabha and the State Assemblies in November/December this year, Chief Minister and TRS supremo K Chandrasekhar Rao has resumed “Operation Akarsh” to woo potential leaders from opposition parties into his party fold.Former minister Danam Nagender, who is considered a strongman in the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC)area, resigned from the membership of the Congress on Friday.
In the letter sent to the AICC high command, Nagendersaid he was quitting the party as BCs, who constitute more than 50 per cent of population of the State, were being neglected by the Congress. Nagender, who has been inactive in the party for the past three years, is expected to join the TRS soon. He is likely to contest from Secunderabad Lok Sabha segment on TRS ticket. This development came as a shock to the faction-ridden Congress, which is already witnessing internal squabbles. It is learnt that the entire operation of wooing Nagender into the TRS fold was done by IT Minister KT Rama Rao.
Sources said KTR had drawn up plans to engineer some more defections from the Congress. Another key leader of the Congress and former minister M Mukesh Goud, along with his son Vikram, is also said to have decided to embrace the ruling party. Further, the AICC high command’s decision appointing SA Sampath Kumar, who was earlier expelled from the State Assembly along with Komatireddy Venkat Reddy, as AICC secretary for Maharashtra, did not go well with the partymen. According to sources, some of the seniors such as C Damodara Rajanarasimha were reportedly unhappy over the elevation of Sampath, who is junior to them.
Danam meets Talasani
Danam Nagender had a detailed meeting with Animal Husbandry Minister Talasani Srinivas Yadav at MLA quarters here, after quitting the party. Later, Talasani told newsmen said he had invited Nagender into the TRS. “Nagender is of the view that the Congress was not giving priority to weaker sections.