Former MP Ponguleti Srinivasa Reddy and Bhadrachalam Zilla Parishad chairman Koram Kanakaiah will join the Congress in the presence of Rahul Gandhi on Sunday.
AICC leader in charge of Telangana Manikrao Thakre said several BJP and BRS leaders were in touch with the party. (Facebook)
Upbeat over the Congress’s resounding victory in the Karnataka Assembly polls, the All India Congress Committee (AICC) leader in charge of Telangana, Manikrao Thakre, said several BJP and BRS leaders were in touch with the party.
In an informal interaction with media persons, the Congress leader said that there would be an influx of leaders from other parties into the Congress after its Khammam public meeting on Sunday, 2 July.
Former MP and BRS leader Ponguleti Srinivasa Reddy would join the Congress at the Khammam meeting, in the presence of Rahul Gandhi.
In a separate but related development, Bhadrachalam Zilla Parishad (ZP) chairman Koram Kanakaiah resigned from the primary membership of the BRS. He said he would also join the Congress on Sunday.
Kanakaiah clarified that he had not resigned from the post of the ZP chairman.
The Khammam meeting would also mark the successful completion of the padayatra of Congress Legislative Party leader Mallu Bhati Vikramarka. Rahul Gandhi will felicitate Vikramarka at the meeting.
Thakre exuded confidence that the Congress would capture power in the Telangana Assembly elections, to be held towards the end of the year, as the tide of public opinion in favour of the grand old party was increasing by the day.
According to Congress sources, several leaders suffocating in the BRS and BJP were contemplating joining the Congress. They would come out openly and don the Congress robes after Sunday’s public meeting.
Around mid-July, former minister Jupally Krishna Rao would join the Congress at a meeting likely to be attended by party general secretary Priyanka Gandhi.
Thakre said that KCR’s dream of increasing BRS’s footprint in Maharashtra would remain a pipedream. He would not be able to win even one seat in the Lok Sabha elections in 2024.
The Congress leader termed KCR’s tall talk of coming to power at the Centre all bluff and bluster. Thakre said that there was a newfound unity among all the leaders and now the Congress was moving forward as a single, cohesive unit.
He expressed confidence that the Scheduled Caste (SC) communities would stay with the Congress.
He said the Congress always gave priority to SCs and substantiated his claim by saying that AICC president Mallikarjun Kharge, Telangana CLP leader Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka, and former deputy chief minister Damodar Raja Narasimha were all SCs.
Meanwhile, the Congress has been making elaborate arrangements for the Khammam meeting.
The party leaders said they were trying to mobilise at least one lakh people for the public meeting where Ponguleti would join the party along with his supporters.
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