AP Assembly Speaker Thammineni Sitaram had issued notices once again to the rebel MLAs asking them to appear before him on February 5. He wanted the MLAs to be present before him after the Governor’s address to both Houses of Assembly and Legislative Council.
He interacted with them on December 29. Out of eight MLAs, only five have attended before the speaker while others avoided any interaction with the Speaker. YSRCP rebel MLAs Anam Ramanarayana Reddy, Mekapati Chandrasekhar Reddy, Kotamreddy Sridhar Reddy and Undavalli Sridevi, TDP rebel MLA Vasupalli Ganesh were present before the speaker and gave their version.
The speaker started acting on the letters and is likely to take a decision before the budget session. Ganta Srinivasa Rao had sent his resignation in protest against the Central government’s move to privatise the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant. He had sent his resignation letter in the speaker format and had even personally met the speaker in 2020. Based on the MLAs request, the speaker accepted his resignation.
While the YSRCP rebel MLAs wanted more time from the speaker to reply to his notices, the lone TDP rebel MLA who attended the enquiry, said that he would accept whatever decision that the speaker takes. Other TDP rebel MLAs, Vallabhaneni Vamsi Mohan and Karanam Balarama Krishna Murthy did not report to the speaker. The four TDP rebel MLA Maddali Giridhar was unavailable as he was on foreign visit.
The speaker who accepted the resignation of TDP MLA and former minister Ganta Srinivasa Rao is likely to take a call on the disqualification of the rebel MLAs. The YSRCP and the TDP have given letters to the speaker seeking their disqualification from the house for floor crossing.
While the TDP MLAs have disassociated with the party and became associate members of the YSRCP, the YSRCP rebel MLAs were suspended by the party for cross voting during the MLC elections. It was alleged that the four MLAs have voted for the TDP against the party’s whip.
