Polarise Reddy Votes: BRS Strategy

Hyderabad: To strike a blow to the Congress party, the ruling BRS is focusing on leaders from the Reddy community, even as Ministers KT Rama Rao and T Harish Rao are ensuring they are brought into the party.

The Congress party is traditionally dominated by leaders from the Reddy community. With TPCC chief A Revanth Reddy also being from the community, there were talks of reunion of the community leaders.

According to sources, the BRS leadership feels that Reddy leaders coming together would polarise votes in many constituencies as these leaders come with big money. The ruling party does not want to take chances as some Reddy leaders have also left in the recent past.

During the last few days several leaders from the community have joined the BRS. They include former MLA P Shashidhar Reddy, who joined in the presence of Harish Rao on Friday. Along with Shashidhar Reddy several other leaders from the Congress party also joined.

Recently, Medak DCC president Kanthareddy Tirupati Reddy also joined the ruling party. He was expecting a ticket from Medak constituency in the ensuing election. However, with rumours that the ticket being reserved for Mynampally Hanumanth Rao’s son Rohit, he quit the party and joined BRS. Similarly, Shyamsundar Reddy from Alair constituency also joined the BRS.

In a latest desertion, Uppal Congress leader SingireddySomashekhar Reddy also resigned. He is the husband of AS Rao Nagar corporator Singireddy Sirisha Reddy. Sources said the BRS leaders are trying to convince the Congress leader to join the party.

Sources also said the BRS leaders are also wooing BC leaders from Congress. While they succeeded in wooing senior Congress leader PonnalaLakshmaiah to resign, they are trying to get other leaders as well. According to the sources, the BRS working president persuaded Lakshmaiah to resign and join the BRS. During an interaction with the media, KTR had said he would visit Ponnala if he agrees to join the party.