Telangana caretaker Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao filed his nomination papers on Wednesday at the office of the returning officer for the Gajwel Assembly constituency in the state's Siddipet town. The Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) chief was accompanied by his nephew and caretaker Irrigation Minister T Harish Rao and caretaker Deputy CM Kadiyam Srihari.
KCR, who claims to be deeply religious and is known to be particular superstitious about date and time, visited the Lord Venkateshwara temple at Koinapally in Siddipet district and performed a pooja at 11:15 am, where he presented his paper in front of the presiding deity. He has been following this ritual since 1983.
The TRS supremo, commonly known as KCR, is contesting from the Gajwel Assembly constituency in Siddipet district for the second consecutive time. Siddipet district is the citadel of the TRS, as KCR has won six times from the Siddipet Assembly seat until — from his first victory in 1985 up till 2004.
He changed his turf in 2006 and contested from Karimnagar for the Lok Sabha polls, won, and then resigned in protest, to demand a separate Telangana state. He was re-elected with a thumping 2.5 lakh majority. Again, in 2008, he resigned during the Telangana agitation and retained the MP seat after being re-elected.
In 2009, he changed his turf once again, and contested as an MP from Mahbubnagar, leaving the Siddipet seat to his nephew T Harish Rao, who has held on to it since.
In 2014, KCR took a gamble by contesting from two seats — the Gajwel Assembly constituency and the Medak Lok Sabha seat. He ended up winning both but resigned his MP post after the TRS formed the government.
KCR won the Gajwel seat with a majority of 19,391 votes. The opposition candidate, the Telugu Desam Party’s Vanteru Pratap Reddy received 67,303 votes. KCR and Pratap Reddy are yet again set to face off, as the Congress has fielded the Pratap Reddy after he defected to the party.
Telangana is all set to go to the polls on December 7. The counting of votes will take place on December 11.