Danam Nagender on the horns of dilemma

Hyderabad: The Hyderabad leader, Danam Nagender who has considerable following among the BCs, has recently joined the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) but when KCR announced the list of 105 candidates on September 6 for the Assembly elections, his name was missing. Switching loyalty has never benefited former Minister Nagender.

Nagender left the Congress in June this year after the party nominated former MP Anjan Kumar Yadav to the post of  President of Hyderabad City Congress Committee. In fact, Nagender has been inactive ever since his defeat in Khairtabad in the hands of BJP's Chintala Ramachandra Reddy in 2014. In 2004, on the eve of general elections, he joined the Telugu Desam party and won from Asifnagar in Hyderabad but later in the election TDP lost power. With Congress leader YS Rajasekhar Reddy taking over as the Chief Minister, Nagender, who was staunch supporter, resigned but in the by-election, he lost the seat.

In 2009, he contested on Congress ticket from Khairatabad (Asifnagar was scrapped in delimitation ) and won and late YSR took him into his cabinet as Health Minister. The Congress lost power in 2014 and he too lost the election from Khairtabad though he was Minister. Now, hoping that the TRS would return to power in 2019 elections, Danam joined the TRS but KCR has kept all but one assembly seat held by the BJP pending, indicating that he may fill weak candidates to help the BJP win as part of ‘secret’ pact with the BJP.

KCR has already announced that B Subhash Reddy will contest from Uppal, reportedly at the request of the BJP as the saffron party believes if Subash Reddy was in the fray, their victory is a fait accompli. Subhash Reddy, fighting on TRS ticket, lost to BJP candidate NVSS Prabhakar in 2014. The four BJP seats on which  KCR has deferred a decision were: Goshamahal (Raja Singh), Amberpet (G Kishan Reddy), Khairatabad (Chintala Ramachandra Reddy) and Musheerabad (Dr K Laxman). 

Even Jubilee Hills is out of bounds for Danam, with KCR re-nominating sitting MLA M Gopinath who joined the TRS from TDP after winning the seat in 2014. Hopes of nominating him for Lok Sabha from Secunderabad too have dimmed since the seat is being represented by BJP senior leader Bandaru Dattatreya. Sources said, he might be sent to the Legislative council, which is the only alternative left to accommodate him.