Hyderabad: Telangana Congress’s Banswada segment in charge, Kasula Balaraj attempted to kill himself by consuming pesticide at his residence on Wednesday, November 8, after he failed to secure a ticket for the upcoming Assembly elections.
This comes following the party high command’s decision to allocate the Kamareddy Assembly segment’s ticket to a non-local over Balraj, despite retaining the support of several party’s mandal-level presidents.
Upset over the non allocation of a ticket, Balaraj announced his fast-on-death protest at his residence, against the Congress leadership.
According to Banswada police, Balaraj after speaking to reporters locked himself in a room. After receiving no response from him for a long time, the family members broke the door open to discover Balraj lying on the floor.
He was then rushed to a local hospital where he was kept under observation for a while and later shifted to a hospital in Nizamabad after his condition worsened.
Balaraj’s election track record
Balaraj had contested from the Banswada segment in 2014 and 2018, however lost to the BRS candidate. He had desired to contest on a Congress ticket this time as well, but the party denied him a ticket based on his past performance.
However, he was upset when the former MLA Enugu Ravinder Reddy, who recently joined the party from the BJP, was given a ticket.
Balaraj was in the BRS and left the pink party along with Eatala Rajender and joined the BJP. Subsequently, he also quit the BJP to join the Congress.
Meanwhile, BJP candidate Yendala Laxminarayana visited the hospital to assess his condition, which is currently stated to be critical.
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