The Congress leadership in Delhi and Telangana is busy finalising the name for the future chief minister as the party had secured absolute majority in the just-concluded election to the State Assembly. The newly elected MLAs have met in Hyderabad on Monday and resolved, as a practice in the Congress, giving powers to the party national president to decide on the Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader.
The new CLP leader would form the government with the names given by the party leadership for the cabinet ministers. This has been the practice in Congress for decades and it had come back to the Telangana state after a decade.
Initially, the Congress leaders wanted to follow the Karnataka formula where the PCC president is made the deputy chief minister, and the CLP leader is made the chief minister. Thus, Siddharamaiah became the chief minister, while Shivakumar became the deputy chief minister.
In Telangana too, the Congress top leadership wanted to follow the same rule, making CLP leader Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka as the chief minister and PCC president Revanth Reddy as the deputy chief minister.
However, when the CLP met on Monday, Revanth Reddy had rejected the offer to be the deputy chief minister. He believed that the Congress won the election in Telangana only because of his leadership.
But Bhatti Vikramarka claims that he had created a positive and winning atmosphere for the party with his padayatra ahead of the general elections. Mallu walked for miles before the schedule came and his padayatra was a great success. He wants the chief minister post and also used the caste card as he belongs to the SC community.
It is certainly going to be a tough knot for the Congress top leadership to make these two leaders agree for the proposal. One does not know what the two leaders will say once confronted with the top leadership.
The issue is likely to be settled by Tuesday evening and the new chief minister and deputy chief minister are likely to take oath in Raj Bhavan on Wednesday.
