Politics in Telangana is heating up with the state unit of the Congress appointing Revanth Reddy as the new chief, former Chief Minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy’s daughter YS Sharmila starting a new party, and the BJP making inroads and hoping to emerge as a prominent contender against the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS). Sometimes, political compulsions result in strange results, from Left-oriented leaders swinging to right-wing parties and vice versa, to having leaders from different parties in the same family. The Dharmapuri family in Telangana’s Nizamabad is a case in point.
In the wake of the changing political scenario during the formation of Telangana, senior leader Dharmapuri Srinivas shifted to the TRS from the Congress and became a Rajya Sabha member. After complaints of anti-party activities by TRS leaders led by Kalvakuntla Kavitha against Srinivas, he has remained silent despite holding a Rajya Sabha seat from the TRS and distanced himself from party activities.
In 2018, Srinivas’ elder son and former Nizamabad mayor Dharmapuri Sanjay was arrested after serious allegations of sexual harassment. Srinivas’ younger son, Dharmapuri Arvind, joined the BJP and even became a Member of Parliament (MP) from Nizamabad by contesting against and defeating Kalvakuntla Kavitha, who is the daughter of Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR). While the younger son has become a prominent BJP leader in the state and a fierce critic of the TRS, the elder son Sanjay remains in political exile.
However, with the recent developments, including Revanth Reddy’s appointment as the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) chief, Sanjay recently met with the leader and announced that he would come back to the Congress, and hit out at the TRS.
"I will work towards strengthening the TPCC under the leadership of Revanth Reddy. I will help restore the past glory of the Congress," he said, adding that he was in Congress since he was young and followed his father, when the latter joined the TRS. Being the first Mayor of the Nizamabad municipal corporation from the Congress party, Sanjay is a familiar face to many people in the town. With Sanjay set to return back to the Congress fold soon, the Dharmapuri family now hosts three prominent leaders in three different political parties in Telangana.
Dharmapuri Srinivas was one of the tallest Congress leaders in erstwhile Andhra Pradesh, having been involved in the politics of Nizamabad for three decades. Having served as a minister in undivided Andhra Pradesh and also as a state Congress chief, his family has a large influence in the region.
With speculation rife that the Congress may try to bring back the 72-year-old Srinivas also into its fold as his tenure in the Rajya Sabha is coming to an end, political observers say that his family’s influence in Nizamabad will continue to remain prominent in the 2023 Assembly elections.