In Telangana, for the first time, Congress is feeling the heat of defections. The party realized that chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao had turned attention to the T-Congress, having finished the Telugu Desam Party. TDP has lost 12 of its MLA from its 15 member TDP legislature party, including the TDLP leader Yerrabelli Dayakar Rao. Barring occasional references to the defections, the Congress had never chosen to register its protest strongly against the alleged engineering of defections by the TRS. It thought KCR would never touch upon the Congress as the party was not an Andhra outfit like the TDP.
Opposition leader K Jana Reddy never addressed the issue with the force it deserved. But, only when Makthal MLA Rammohan Reddy quit the Congress yesterday to join the TRS yesterday, did the party feel the threat to its existence.
Jana Reddy has got recognition as leader of the opposition with great difficulty as the Congress hasn’t had enough strength to get the honor. Now, any dip in the strength of the party would unsettle his position as the Leader of Opposition. So, Jana Reddy today raised his voice against defections, stoutly today.
He said KCR was resorting to amoral and unconstitutional methods to lure the MLAs of other parties into TRS. Addressing media Reddy said the day was not far off when the people of the state teach him a lesson.
Expressing displeasure at KCR not asking the turncoats to resign from Assembly before joining the TRS, Jana recalled how he resigned from Assembly when he wanted to change the party.
” There should be a provision incorporated in the Constitution to make the defector lose the membership of the House automatically. Congress will extend support to such an attempt. Its high time that the Prime Minister took a decision to prevent defections,” he said.
” Power is not permanent. One should not be arrogant out of power. Those in power should remember that that neither their strength nor their power are permanent,” he said.
Another MLA DK Aruna, brother of MLA Rammohan Reddy, demanded KCR that he should ask her brother to resign and seek reelection.
