The Congress in Telangana suffered yet another major blow on Monday with one more of its MlAs Puvvada Ajaykumar and member of legislative council (MlC) Farooq Hussain defecting to the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samiti.
Puvvada Ajaykumar, who represents Khammam in the State Assembly joined the TRS just a couple of days before his constituency was to host the 14th Plenary of TRS.
Both Ajaykumar and Farooq Hussain were formally welcomed in to the TRS fold by the party president and Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao at his camp office by offering them the pink colour bandana, symbol of the TRS.
Farooq Hussain, who was elected to the legislative council in 2011 on the Congress ticket hails from KCR’s home district Medak and was a friend of KCR for many years. He also held many senior positions in Congress party.
Puvvada Ajaykumar blamed Congress leadership for his depature saying the young leaders were not getting any encouragement in the party. With his resignation the strength of Congress in the State Assembly has come down to 13 from 21. Congress suffered the setback at a time when another Assembly constituency Paleru in Khammam district was going to by election following the death of Congress MlA R Venkat Reddy.
Interestingly Congress had managed to bring all the major Opposition parties on a single platform against the TRS in the Paleru by elections. It had successfully persuaded the Telugu Desam and the CPI to extend support to its candidate paving way for a straight fight with the TRS. Observers say that Puvvada Ajaykumar’s defection was bound to brighten the prospects of the ruling party in the by elections.
So far 7 MlAs of Congress and 11 MlAs of the TDP have defected to the TRS.