The Congress in Telangana has stiff competition – not only from the ruling TRS and its populist schemes, but also from dissenting leaders. In order to quell the rebellion within the party, the high command has sent in its ace troubleshooter DK Shivakumar to pacify the disgruntled leaders who did not get tickets to contest the election.
Shivakumar, who arrived in Telangana on Thursday, met with the rebelling leaders in Warangal and Serilingampally. Sources in the Congress say that DK Shivakumar held talks with the leaders and has managed to pacify them.
“In Warangal, DK Shivakumar met Nayani Rajender Reddy and he also met Bhikshapathi Yadav from Serilingampally, who were dissenting. He has managed to convince the leaders to stop their rebellion to ensure that the party does not face problems from its own leaders,” the source said.
DK Shivakumar’s task was to ensure that the rebelling leaders do not campaign against the party’s own candidates or make controversial statements against the party.
“When the 40 leaders were thinking about forming the rebel front, the leaders in the state began working towards quelling the rebellion. But when several others did not listen, DK Shivakumar and a few other leaders were roped in to pacify the dissenting ones,” the source said.
The party set up a three-member leadership committee headed by Puducherry Chief Minister V Narayanasamy, along with DK Shivakumar and Puducherry Health Minister Malladi Krishna Rao to convince the rebels to withdraw their nominations.
As the last day of withdrawing nominations ended on Thursday, as many as 367 out of 2,653 candidates withdrew their nominations for the upcoming Telangana elections. Many of the candidates who withdrew their nominations were rebel candidates from Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee and the Telangana Rashtra Samithi, who were not given party tickets to contest the elections.
A group of rebel leaders, led by former Ministers Boda Janardhan (who aspired for the Chennur ticket) and Vijayarama Rao (who wanted the Station Ghanpur ticket for the Congress), met earlier in November and had decided to form the rebel front.
The rebel leaders were miffed as the party had refused them tickets to contest the upcoming elections.