New Delhi: Telangana Rashtra Samithi’s (TRS) Gadwal Vijayalakshmi was elected as the new Mayor of Greater Hyderabad on Thursday. She is the fourth woman mayor in the municipal body’s history and was elected from Banjara Hills division in the GHMC polls that was held in December last year.
Reports suggest Vijayalakshmi is from the BC (Munurukapu) caste which can be said to be one of the key reason, TRS choose her as their candidate for the Mayor’s post. After being elected as Hyderabad’s 17th Mayor Vijayalakshmi said, “I feel very proud, I thank both CM KCR and KTR for choosing two women. There are many things I want to concentrate on. As a woman, I promise complete safety for women in Hyderabad. Be it roads, drainage, etc there are many issues. We will address all these issues. I have a vision.”
Vijayalakshmi is the daughter of TRS general secretary and Rajya Sabha member K. Keshav Rao and has educational degrees of B.A., LLB and a course in Journalism. She has spent much of her early life in Hyderabad, where she completed her schooling from Holy Mary School, after which she did her graduation from Reddy Women’s College and completed a course in journalism from Bharathiya Vidya Bhavan. Later, she went on to study further and completed her law degree from Sultan Ul Uloom Law College.
She is married to Bobby Reddy and had stayed in the United States for 18 years where she worked as a research assistant in Duke University, North Carolina, in cardiology department. Duke University is one of the fifth largest research Universities.
However, Vijayalakshmi returned to India in 2007 and giving up her US citizenship to join her father in politics. In 2016 she contested as a corporator from TRS party and won with a huge majority.