Another BRS MLA joins Congress, sixth in four months

Hyderabad, June 28 (IANS) In yet another jolt to Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS), its MLA Kale Yadaiah joined the ruling Congress on Friday.

Yadaiah, who represents the Chevella constituency in Rangareddy district, joined the Congress in the presence of Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy, AICC in-charge Deepa Dasmunshi and other leaders in Delhi.

Yadaiah is the sixth MLA of BRS to defect to the Congress party in the last four months.

The BRS has lost three MLAs to Congress during the last week. Several senior leaders of BRS switched loyalties to Congress since the latter came to power in December 2023.

It is a homecoming for Yadaiah, who had defected to BRS in 2015 a few months after he was elected to Assembly on a Congress ticket. In 2018, he retained the Chevella seat as BRS candidate.

In the Assembly elections held in November 2023, Yadaiah won Chevella seat for a third consecutive term, defeating Congress party's P. Beem Bharat by a slender margin of 268 votes.

Yadaiah had met Revanth Reddy in March, triggering speculations that he would join Congress soon. The MLA had clarified that he met the Chief Minister to discuss development programmes in his constituency.

BRS MLA and former Speaker Pocharam Srinivas Reddy joined the Congress party on June 21. The MLA from Banswada in Nizamabad district is a prominent leader and a former minister.

Two days later, BRS MLA from Jagtial constituency M. Sanjay Kumar joined the Congress.

However, Sanjay Kumar's admission triggered dissent in the party with senior leader and former minister T. Jeevan Reddy threatening to resign as Member of Legislative Council.

Jeevan Reddy, who had lost to Sanjay in 2018 and 2023 from Jagtial, was unhappy with the Chief Minister for admitting Sanjay into the party without consulting him. The central leadership of Congress has summoned Jeevan Reddy to Delhi to pacify him.

The former minister also questioned the need for making BRS MLAs defect to Congress when the ruling party is strong with 65 members in the 119-member Assembly.

BRS had won 39 seats in the 119-member Assembly. The series of defections and the defeat in the recent by-election to Secunderabad Cantonment constituency brought down its strength to 32.