The release of list of TRS candidates for Assembly elections by party president and caretaker Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao on Thursday has caused heartburn among many of those who are left out of the list, but it has not come out in the open.
A leader from Warangal, who lost in the previous elections, said he was not even consulted though he had spent time and money since the party inception. “There is a lot of opposition among aspirants who did not figure in the list”.
Another leader from Hyderabad said there was no sanctity to the list as the election process was not even put in motion. He added that he had met Mr. Rao after the release of the list and the latter had promised him that he would be accommodated.
While discontent brewed among leaders who did not get into the list, there was palpable anxiety in aspirants for 14 seats that are yet to be announced. They include five seats held by sitting TRS MLAs Budige Sobha (Choppadandi), Konda Surekha (Warangal- East), B. Sanjeeva Rao (Vikarabad), M. Sudhir Reddy (Medchal) and C. Kanaka Reddy (Malkajgiri). Mr. Rao had said he would look into the candidature of these MLAs after talking to them.
Mr. Rao also did not name candidates for nine more constituencies, six of which are in Hyderabad. He renominated Jubilee Hills MLA Maganti Gopinath who defected from Telugu Desam, but this went against the interests of Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen as the latter looked for a friendly contest with TRS. The MIM was in touch with TRS for friendly contest in Jubilee Hills where it stood second in last elections.
Sources said former Congress leader Danam Nagender, who recently joined the TRS, aspired for nomination from Khairatabad, where the candidate is yet to be finalised, but he was asked to consider Goshamahal. Candidates for both Khairatabad and Goshamahal, Malakpet, Amberpet, Musheerabad and Charminar were not announced in the city. The TRS candidate at Charminar last time, Inayat Ali Baqri, was shifted to Bahadurpura.
Elsewhere in Nalgonda, selection for Huzurnagar and Kodad, represented by TPCC president N. Uttam Kumar Reddy and his wife Padmavathi respectively, are pending.