Published May 31, 2026 | 11:08 AM ⚊ Updated May 31, 2026 | 11:35 AM
APCC chief YS Sharmila
Synopsis: The decision to give one berth to Sharmila is in accordance with the promise made to her when she joined the party ahead of the Andhra Pradesh Assembly elections in 2024. She even contested from the Kadapa Lok Sabha constituency on behalf of Congress but lost.
YS Sharmila, president of the Andhra Pradesh Congress unit, is being sent to the Rajya Sabha from Karnataka.
The decision was conveyed by AICC president Mallikarjun Kharge to senior party leaders from Andhra Pradesh, South First has learnt. Sharmila is the daughter of former chief minister of united Andhra Pradesh, YS Rajasekhara Reddy.
The Congress is in a position to win three Rajya Sabha seats from Karnataka in the upcoming elections in June. AICC president Mallikarjun Kharge is expected to be renominated while the third seat was offered to outgoing chief minister Siddaramaiah. With Siddaramaiah declining the seat, the party has asked him to suggest a candidate of his choice instead.
Sharmila’s nomination comes despite opposition by pro-Kannada groups who have demanded that Rajya Sabha member from Karnataka should hail from the state. “It has always been a convention to give one seat to a leader from outside the state,” pointed out a Congress leader in response.
The decision to give one berth to Sharmila is in accordance with the promise made to her when she joined the party ahead of the Andhra Pradesh Assembly elections in 2024. She even contested from the Kadapa Lok Sabha constituency on behalf of Congress but lost.
Sharmila, who fell out with her brother, former Andhra chief minister and YSRCP chief YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, initially floated her own political outfit but the experiment did not last long. She wound it up and then joined the Congress.
Post division of Andhra Pradesh, the Congress has completely lost ground in the residuary state with the vote share plummeting to below five percent. Sharmila’s elevation is unlikely to improve the Congress situation in a State where the politics are dominated by the ruling TDP and Jagan Mohan Reddy’s YSRCP.
However, the thinking in Congress leadership seems to be to erase the impression that the party has not been kind to YS Rajashekhar Reddy’s family post his death in an helicopter crash in 2009. A spree of cases were booked against Jagan Mohan Reddy forcing him to part ways and form his own political party.
Though Sharmila undertook a padayatra when Jagan was in jail, the latter did not reward her with any position in the subsequent years, including when he was the chief minister between 2019 and 2024. Many perceive that the complete shift of Congress vote to Jagan was on account of the perception among people that Congress was unkind to YSR family.
From the seats up for grabs from Andhra Pradesh, TDP’s ally, Jana Sena, is most likely to nominate businessman Lingamaneni Ramesh. He has been a strong supporter of Pavan Kalyan in every way from the time he floated the party.
Also Read: The silent anti-incumbency building in rural Andhra
