As the top leadership and the thousand of delegates were gathering for the 14th plenary of Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) in Khammam city on Wednesday, Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao has put a seal of finality on the position of his son K Taraka Rama Rao as the heir-apparent by allocating many more significant portfolios to him.
The reshuffle in the portfolios of several Ministers has also confirmed that KCR, as the Chief Minister was popularly known for sidelining the other powerful figure in the party from his family T Harish Rao to make the imminent elevation of his son as his successor a smooth affair.
KCR has divested T Harish Rao of the important mining portfolio and handed it over to K Taraka Rama Rao, who has now emerged as the number two in the State Cabinet.
While Harish Rao will now have only portfolio of irrigation, Taraka Rama Rao will be running all the key financial Ministries including industry, commerce, public enterprises, mining and geology in addition to the existing departments of urban development and municipal administration and information technology. Jupally Krishna Rao has lost his industries portfolio to Taraka Rama Rao.
Talasani Srinivas Yadav has lost his commercial taxes portfolio to the Chief Minister who has also taken over the Ministry for rural drinking water supply.
Though it was never a secret that the Chief Minister was grooming his US educated son to be his successor, his rapid rise in importance in the Cabinet was a clear signal to other leaders in the party to fall in line and acknowledge the future leader.
Though T Harish Rao, KCR’s nephew never staked a claim on the leadership, it was also a known fact that the two new gen leaders had an comfortable equation. Unlike Taraka Rama Rao, who entered active politics after completing his education in US, Harish Rao was with KCR like his shadow ever since he launched the TRS in 2001 and worked hard to strengthen the party.
KCR publicly praised Harish Rao for his services in the party and the Government but finally the blood proved thicker than the other factors and it was now clear that Taraka Rama Rao would eventually succeed his father whenever the occasion arises.
Many loyalists of Harish Rao were shocked by the fact that he was divested of mining portfolio by the Chief Minister and were fearing further schism in the party.
But KCR’s daughter and member of Parliament K Kavita denied any such problem. “Both KTR and Harish are equal and the same for the TRS”, she said stressing that all the leaders of the party were working to achieve the goal of Golden Telangana. She told the media that it was not correct to attribute motives to the reshuffling of portfolios.
Another senior Minister Tummala Nageshwara Rao had created ripples recently when he had declared that he will not support K Taraka Rama Rao as successor to KCR as he was against family rule.
Meanwhile Khammam, once a citadel of the left, was painted pink for the ruling party’s plenary which will be attended by more than four thousand delegates from across the State. KCR and other leaders will address a public meeting in the evening.
The entire city was decked up with colorful arches, cutouts, flexis and flags by the TRS rank and file and the pink was the dominant color. Party general secretary K Keshav Rao said that the plenary will pass 15 resolutions covering various programs, schemes, policies and initiatives of the two year old Government in the State.
One of the resolutions will highlight the fact that the state had become free from the power cuts bringing huge relief to the people in the face of worst heat wave in the recent memory.
The plenary will also discuss the drought situation in the state.