KARIMNAGAR: It seems former Choppadandi MLA and TRS leader Bodige Shobha will be disappointed this Assembly election. Sources in the party say that its high command has decided against nominating her and letting her get a chance to retain the seat. However, there is still quite a bit of uncertainty since the party hasn’t announced the current candidate either. And in this uncertainty, Sunke Ravi Shanker, TRS State SC Cell Chairman and an aspirant for the ticket, has begun campaigning with much gusto.
It may be recalled that Choppadandi was one of the few seat that the Telangana Rashtra Samithi did not announce candidates for in the first list released as soon as the Assembly was dissolved. The party had released named of 105 candidates out of 119 seats in the Assembly. At Choppadandi, the reason for Shobha’s candidature going ‘on hold’ is believed to be the opposition she faces from members of her own party in the region.
It is learnt that Shobha was involved in many altercations, many of them with TRS workers, during her term as MLA. Just a few days before the Assembly dissolution, she was involved in a fight that seems to have sealed her fate. She was one of the guests at an inauguration ceremony of a fire station and sharing the stage with Gaddam Chokka Reddy, Arnakonda Single Window Director.
All was going fine until the chief guest Karimnagar MP Vinod Kumar handed over the ceremonial coconut to Reddy instead of Shobha. Immediately, to the shock of everyone present there, Shobha pushed Reddy aside in an attempt to snatch the coconut away from him and break it herself. A few days later, smarting the insult meted out him, Reddy met with then-Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao to complain on Shobha. Since then, Shobha’s political career seems to have stopped in its tracks.
Meanwhile, Shobha maintains that she will get the Choppadandi ticket. At the same time, there are also rumours that Shobha could join BJP on October 10, in the presence of party supremo Amit Shah who will campaign there. Shobha, however, denied that there was any substance to these rumours.
Additionally, there is no shortage of TRS members lashing out against Shobha. TRS leader and District Library Chairman Anugu Ravinder Reddy, speaking to media scoffed at Shobha’s statements that she was a disciplined and sincere TRS worker. “She has insulted so many people in the last four years. She is an extremely arrogant person and her sins have finally caught up to her,” he said.