Hyderabad: Telangana Assembly Speaker Gaddam Prasad on Wednesday, March 11, dismissed the disqualification petitions against Khairatbad MLA Danam Nagender and Station Ghanpur MLA Kadiyam Srihari.
The Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) had filed a petition against 10 MLAs, including these two, stating that they had won the 2023 Assembly elections on BRS tickets and later switched to the Congress. However, during an inquiry conducted by the speaker, both MLAs stated that they remain members of the BRS and denied switching over to the ruling party.
Srihari and Nagender denied receiving a whip from the BRS. The Khairataba MLA said he was working alongside Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy for the betterment of Hyderabad. After hearing their statements, Prasad recognised them as BRS MLAs and did not disqualify them.
The Speaker’s decision comes a day before the case is to be heard by the Supreme Court.
KTR calls verdict attack on democracy
Reacting to the verdict, BRS Working President KT Ram Rao called it an attack on democracy. In a statement, KTR said that giving a clean chit to leaders who won on one party’s ticket but later switched loyalties to another party amounted to insulting the people’s mandate.
In a post on X, the former Telangana minister said, “This decision taken by the Speaker to encourage party defections is a dark day in democratic history. This is not just a judgment… It’s an example of using constitutional systems favorably for those in power.”
“If elected positions won with people’s votes are changed for personal gains, and the Speaker stamps approval for it — where do democratic values stand?” he asked.
