Hyderabad: “My life’s sole objective, from now on, is dislodging KCR from power,” roared Anumula Revanth Reddy in a street present in Hyderabad in July 2015, after the Telangana Excessive Court docket granted bail launch from the Cherlapally jail on the outskirts.
It took him eight years and 5 months, and a change in political affiliation, to realize the goal. On Sunday, because the Telangana election outcomes confirmed the exit to two-term CM Ok. Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR), Congress leaders like D.Ok. Shivakumar congratulated PCC chief Revanth Reddy with sweets for the achievement.
Revanth not solely managed to dislodge KCR from the seat but in addition is the entrance runner for the CM put up, based on Congress leaders.
In Might 2015, Revanth, then a legislator of Telugu Desam Celebration (TDP), was arrested by the Telangana ACB for allegedly bribing a nominated MLA to assist his occasion within the then MLC elections. TDP chief after which Andhra Pradesh CM Chandrababu Naidu additionally confronted warmth within the episode, which got here to be often called the ‘note-for-vote’ scandal.
Revanth had claimed that he was focused by KCR for exposing his mis-governance, land offers with an actual property group. “To eject the KCR family from politics, I’ll visit every nook and corner of Telangana to stir the public, especially the youth,” he had pledged within the procession on the best way to the TDP headquarters in Banjara Hills.
Because the Congress state chief and star-campaigner now, Revanth went on a whirlwind tour of the state, addressing round 85 public conferences interesting the voters to ship KCR to his farmhouse and his son and Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) working president Ok.T.Rama Rao again to the US.
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Stints throughout political spectrum
Revanth was born in a farmer’s household in Kondareddipalle village close to Kalwakurthy in undivided Andhra Pradesh (now in south Telangana) on 8 November, 1968. His election affidavit says he accomplished a BA course on the AV Faculty in Hyderabad in 1992.
Related to the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) in his scholar life, Revanth started his political profession in 2001-02 with the then fledgling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (now BRS). After a disenchanted stint, Revanth efficiently contested the 2006 Zilla Parishad Territorial Council election as an Impartial.
A few of his spectacular, preliminary victories had been in opposition to the Congress. In 2007, Revanth, once more as an Impartial, defeated Congress candidate within the Mahbubnagar space native our bodies MLC polls.
Revanth then caught the attention of Chandrababu Naidu, joined the TDP in 2008 and was elected an MLA from Kodangal first time in 2009, defeating the Congress candidate with a close to 7,000-vote margin. He doubled the bulk in 2014, profitable once more from the identical seat. Later, Naidu elevated him as the Telangana TDP working president and meeting ground chief.
Identified for his corrosive oration, Revanth had repeatedly focused the KCR regime over a number of points. In his public speeches, Revanth, unhesitatingly, dubbed KCR, as a ‘taagubothu’ (drunkard) and ‘sannasi’ (ascetic however popularly used right here to imply fool).
In October 2017, because the TDP clout started to decrease in Telangana with Naidu shifting his administrative set as much as Amaravati, Revanth joined the Congress occasion.
It’s mentioned that KCR was so vexed with him that the TRS leaders and cadres got the goal of defeating Revanth at any price in Kodangal to cease his reentry into the meeting. Revanth was trounced in his two-term seat in December 2018, which he reclaimed Sunday.
He, nonetheless, was elected because the Congress MP within the 2019 common election from Malkajgiri, one of many largest Lok Sabha segments within the nation.
Not like the opposite Telangana TDP MLAs who defected to the TRS, Revanth maintained cordial relations with Naidu. Revanth was branded by a few of his personal occasion leaders as “an outsider, Naidu’s man in Telangana politics.” Brushing apart such aspersions, the Congress management selected to make him the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) chief in June 2021, following the occasion’s repeated bypoll losses in Telangana.
The Gandhis had been strongly supporting Revanth in the course of the elections, quelling any dissent, and, Revanth, occasion insiders mentioned, managed to reside as much as their expectations.
In the course of the time of nomination, some Congress leaders denied tickets, reportedly accused Revanth of “selling off the tickets”, prompting the opposition and detractors to launch an out of doors and social media marketing campaign with hashtag #RatenthaReddy (What’s the speed, Reddy?)
Accusations apart, Revanth is now credited for galvanising the Congress staff along with his emotive speeches and main the occasion to victory.
“Whatever his affiliations, ambitions are, Revanth has been a committed crusader. I remember him as a youngster actively participating in our agitation for Srisailam reservoir backwaters over two decades back,” Purushotham Reddy, a retired professor from Osmania College, who hails from the identical parched Achampet-Kalwakurthy space as Revanth’s, informed ThePrint.
Hoping that “he will be a better CM than KCR,” famous political scientist Prof. G. Haragopal informed ThePrint that he expects Revanth “to restore democratic space in the state, be human centric and value institutions like the universities.”
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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