Hyderabad: The decision to get Vanteru Prathapa Reddy into TRS fold is raising several eyebrows over the possible strategy of Telangana chief minister K Chandrashekhar Rao behind this move. The immediate impact of Vanteru’s joining TRS will be on local political dimension and T Harish Rao’s role in the Gajwel constituency.
Harish Rao—KCR’s nephew, former irrigation minister and Siddipet MLA– has been looking after Gajwel constituency on behalf of TRS supremo. Once Vanteru is given the responsibility of Gajwel constituency, we can’t see any major role of Harish Rao here, forecasts a political analyst.
According to party sources, KCR may contest for Lok Sabha to make his mission Federal Front happen. This will result in a by-election in Gajwel Constituency.
“If KCR doesn’t contest from Gajwel constituency, Vanteru’s win is almost certain. This is the reason, maybe KCR doesn’t want to lose chief minister’s constituency to Congress in case Vanteru wins in the by-election,” he observed.
TRS party cadres also agree that there’s no strong candidate to defeat Vanteru, who gave a tough fight to KCR. Vanteru contested from Gajwel constituency in 2014 on TDP ticket and in 2018 on Congress ticket.
KCR in December 2018 elections won against Vanteru with a majority of 58,200 votes. KCR had garnered 60.45 per cent vote share and Vanteru got 32.36 per cent.
“Since there’s no strong candidate in TRS party after KCR to defeat Vanteru if by-election takes place, maybe the TRS supremo decided to get him into his side. We heard that KCR may offer him MLC post. In case, KCR contests as MP, then Vanteru is most probably the TRS MLA candidate in Gajwel,” said a TRS leader from Gajwel.
