Hyderabad: Major setback in the recent Lok Sabha election does not seems to have changed a bit the attitude of the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) towards the opposition as it continues its mission to encourage defections from Congress party.
Giving final touches to its plans of merging the breakaway group of Congress legislature party with itself, TRS has wooed one more Congress MLA P Rohit from Tandur on Thursday.
With this the total number of Congress MLA defecting to the TRS has reached upto 12 fulfilling the legal requirement of two third members’ support to their formal merger with the TRS.
While Rohit met the TRS working President K Taraka Rama Rao to discuss his plans of joining TRS, the group of 12 rebel Congress MLAs also met the Telangana legislative assembly speaker Pocharam Srinvas Reddy and submitted a petition seeking the merger with the TRS. The representation was signed by all the 12 defectors.
One of the MLAs Vanama Venkateshwara Rao told the reporters that the group had already met the Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao and expressed its desire to join the TRS. “The Chief Minister has agreed to our request and merger of our group with the TRS was a mere formality”, he said. “The people have supported our decision as we are joining TRS for the development of our respective constituencies”.
Under the anti-defection law if two third members of assembly of a party break away, they will not attract disqualification. In the last assembly elections Congress had won 19 assembly seats and 11 of them had defected to TRS during last few months. To reach the required two thirds strength, defection of two more members was required. However with the election of a Congress MLA N Uttam Kumar Reddy to the Lok Sabha and his resignation from assembly has brought down the total number of Congress to 18 and the two thirds strength also came down to 12 paving the way for the merger of the breakaway group with the TRS.
If the strength of Congress falls down to mere 6, the party will lose the post of the Leader of Opposition in the assembly and the total strength of ruling party will go up to 104 in the House of 120.
Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka was the Leader of Opposition till now but if the break way group was merged with TRS he will lose the post.
Angered over the latest developments senior Congress leaders including Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka and the state Congress president N Uttam Kumar Reddy held a sit in protest within in the premises of the state assembly on Thursday. Speaking to the media persons Uttam Kumar Reddy charged the TRS with acting in an unconstitutional and anti democratic manner. “This is murder of democracy in broad day light”, he said.