AMN / HYDERABAD
In a major setback to the Congress party in Telangana, four of its six Members of Legislative council (MLCs) in Telangana have defected to the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS).
The four Congress MLCs – MS Prabhakar Rao, T Santosh Kumar, K Damodar Reddy and Akula Lalitha met Legislative Council Chairman K Swamy Goud and petitioned him to merge them with the TRS.
Hours later, the Council secretary issued a bulletin informing members of the House about the chairman recognising the merger. The development came barely 10 days after the Congress party’s debacle in the assembly polls.
The Congress had six members in the 40-member council. Now it is left with only two – Mohammed Ali Shabbir and P Sudhakar Reddy. The development means that Shabbir, the Leader of the Opposition in the Council, will lose his status for which a party has to have 1/10th of the total strength of the House.