Telangana governor Tamilisai Soundararajan on Thursday, January 25, urged the election commission to take strict action against the candidates who threaten to kill themselves if people don't vote for them in the elections. The governor was referring to BRS legislator Padi Kaushik Reddy who had threatened to die by suicide along with his family members in the recent Assembly elections.
Speaking on the occasion of National Voters day at Hyderabad’s Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU) Tamilisai said that such indirect means of influencing voters must be curtailed.
“A candidate sought votes by saying he would die by suicide if he was not voted to power. The election commision must take strong action,” Tamilisai said. “Good people must be elected for good governance and democracy must be safeguarded by the rules,” she added.
In one of his election speeches Kaushik Reddy said, “If I am not elected, you (public) will see three dead bodies from my family including mine.” Kaushik Reddy contested from Huzurabad constituency. In the previous bye-election he had lost to BJP leader Eatala Rajender. Keeping this in mind, Kaushik made a strange appeal to the people pleading to vote for him. Kaushik had also faced severe flak for using his teenage daughter for his election campaign. His teenage daughter and wife also made videos ‘begging’ people to vote for Kaushik.
In the recent election, Kaushik won against Eatala Rajender with a margin of 16873 votes. However, the BRS party lost power.
This is not the first time that the Governor has found fault with Kaushik. During the previous BRS government Tamilisai had rejected the government’s proposal to nominate Kaushik as the Member of the Legislative Council. The Huzurabad MLA had also harshly criticized the Governor using derogatory language inviting summons from the National Commission for Women.