Vijayashanthi, two other Congress candidates file nominations for MLC polls in Telangana
Hyderabad, March 10 (IANS) Actor-politician Vijayashanthi, Addanki Dayakar, and Kethavath Shankar Naik filed nominations as Congress candidates for biennial elections to the Telangana Legislative Council on Monday.
Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy, Deputy Chief Minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka, Congress state President Mahesh Kumar Goud, ministers, MLAs and other leaders were present.
Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge on Sunday approved the candidatures of the three leaders. The party also decided to leave one seat to its ally, the Communist Party of India (CPI).
Meanwhile, Nellikanti Satyam filed the nomination as the CPI candidate.
Members of the State Legislative Assembly will elect five members to the Legislative Council on March 20.
The vacancies are arising due to the retirement of four MLCs of Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) including Mallesham Yegge, who defected to the Congress from the BRS last year and Mirza Riyazul Hassan Effendi of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM).
Congress has 65 members in the 119-member Assembly and also enjoys the support of 10 BRS MLAs who defected last year. Its ally CPI has one MLA while friendly party AIMIM has seven members.
The BRS, which has 28 members, has fielded Dasoju Sravan Kumar as its candidate.
Earlier, Addanki Dayakar, along with his wife, met the Chief Minister at his residence and thanked him. Dayakar is a state unit General Secretary and belongs to Scheduled Castes.
Kethavath Shankar Naik, District Congress Committee president from Nalgonda, is from Scheduled Tribes. Both Dayakar and Naik were aspirants for a Congress ticket in the 2023 Assembly elections but, the party leadership had assured them that they would be given some other posts.
The Congress has rewarded Vijayashanthi, who quit as a BJP national executive member, to join Congress just before the 2023 Assembly elections.
The former MP, who belongs to the Backward Class, was promised a suitable position at the time of joining Congress.
Popular as ‘Lady Amitabh’ for her action roles in Telugu films, Vijayashanthi had joined the BJP in 1997.
She quit the BJP in 2005 to float a separate outfit, Talli Telangana, to fight for separate statehood for Telangana. She later merged Talli Telangana with the TRS (now BRS) and was elected to the Lok Sabha from the Medak constituency in 2009.
Vijayashanthi joined the Congress in 2013 after TRS suspended her for anti-party activities. She unsuccessfully contested from Medak Assembly constituency in the 2014 polls.
After the Congress’ debacle in 2018, she became inactive and returned to the BJP in 2020.
–IANS
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