Twenty Nine-year old Andhra Pradesh Tribal Welfare Minister Kidari Sravan Kumar is likely to face an embarrassing situation as he may have to step down from the State Cabinet on May 10 after failing to either getting elected or nominated as a legislator in the AP Legislature by then.
On November 11, when Mr. Sravan Kumar, an IIT-Benaras almunus, was sworn in as a Minister along with N.M.D. Farookh, nobody dreamt that he would face such a situation six month later.
According to highly placed sources in Raj Bhavan here, the officials while going through certain regular files came across the anomaly wherein the General Administration Department (Election) failed to take any steps to either see that a file was put up to remind the government about the end of the six month period.
Governor alerted
The lapse was brought to the notice of Governor E.S.L.Narasimhan too, sources maintained. Accordingly, a communication was sent to the AP government on Tuesday evening, it is learnt. On May 10, Mr. Sravan Kumar may cease to be a Minister as a communique will be issued saying he is deemed to have been removed.
Sources said it is strange that the AP government failed to initiate steps to see that Mr. Sravan Kumar fulfilled the constitutional obligation under Article 164 (4), which says: “A Minister who for any period of six consecutive months is not a member of the Legislature of the State shall at the expiration of that period cease to be a Minister.”
However, the TDP had given him the ticket for Araku seat in the just concluded Assembly elections on April 11. The seat was earlier represented by his slain father Kidari Sarveswara Rao. The sitting TDP MLA was shot dead along with another former MLA Siveri Soma by Maoists last year.
Election results
As the Araku Assembly seat had fallen vacant, the EC did not notify elections on the ground that General Elections including the elections to AP Assembly would be held sometime in April/May. But, the results of the Assembly elections are to be declared only on May 23 which is much beyond the six month deadline for Mr. Sravan to continue as a Minister without being elected as an MLA or nominated as an MLC.
The other instance reported in the annals of the united AP politics was when late Nandamuri Harikrishna, who was Transport Minister in the Cabinet headed by N. Chandrababu Naidu in 1996 after the ouster of late N.T.Rama Rao in 1995, had to resign on failing to get elected as an MLA. Although, he subsequently won from Hindupur Assembly constituency, Harikrishna was not inducted into the Council of Ministers.