KCR names 3 for Rajya Sabha

Hyderabad: Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao on Wednesday announced the names of candidates for three vacant Rajya Sabha seats. Of them one will be a byelection following the resignation of Banda Prakash. There are two upper caste candidates and one is from the backward caste.

The three candidates, who were given B forms by KCR, are Hetero Group chairman and managing director Bandi Parthasaradhi Reddy. He is a businessman-turned-politician, Vaddiraju Ravichandra (alias Gayatri Ravi) of Gayatri Granites Khammam and chairman of Namaste Telangana D Damodar Rao.

Parthasaradhi Reddy played a key role in nurturing the Hetero Group to emerge as the largest closely held pharmaceutical company in India and also a world leader in production of anti-retroviral drugs.

Vaddiraju Ravichandra will be filing nomination for the byelection on Thursday. He is a granite businessman-turned-politician who contested the Assembly polls unsuccessfully in 2018 from Warangal Urban. Later, he joined TRS and has been working for the party. It may be mentioned here that TRS has been witnessing some political turmoil in Khammam politics.

Two other leaders Ponguleti Srinivas Reddy and former minister Tummala Nageswara Rao were also aspirants from Khammam. However, the chief minister picked on Ravi. He joined the TRS in April 2019 after unsuccessfully contesting on the Congress ticket from Warangal East Assembly constituency in 2018.

D Damodar Rao is a law graduate and has been the member of TRS party right since its launch. He has worked closely with K Chandrashekhar Rao as the party finance secretary.