Within three years of holding reins of Telangana Congress, Anumula Revanth Reddy led the party to victory in the state against BRS and fulfilled the promise of dethroning K Chandrashekhar Rao he had long envisaged. Nearly eight years ago, he had vowed to remove KCR from power and “make him irrelevant.” Ironically, Revanth Reddy began his career under none other than KCR himself.
Born in 1969 at Kondareddy Palli of Mahbubnagar district in a non-political family, Revanth studied BA at Osmania University. As a student, he joined the Akhil Bharatiya Vishwa Hindu, an RSS-affiliated student organisation. Shortly after that, he married Geeta, the daughter of late veteran Congress leader Jaipal Reddy.
Scaling political ranks
Before entering politics, he briefly dabbled in real estate business. Then in 2001, Revanth joined the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (now BRS), but parted ways shortly afterwards. In 2007, he contested and won as an independent MLC candidate from Mahbubnagar district. Later, he joined the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and became a loyalist to its chief N Chandrababu Naidu.
In 2009, he was elected an MLA from Kodangal constituency for the first time. He retained the seat in the next elections.
After the formation of Telangana, the TDP still had 15 MLAs in the state legislative. Smelling gold, and dreaming of ruling both Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, Naidu appointed Revanth as the party’s working president of Telangana.
Sensing winds of change, and TDP effective ouster from Telangana, Revanth joined Congress along with several other TDP leaders. However, in 2018, Revanth lost to TRS (Now BRS) candidate Patnam Narender Reddy.
Arrested for bribery
The appointment of Revanth Reddy as TDP’s Telangana president could cost TRS (now BRS) heavily, and KCR was very well aware of this. Apart from his shrewd sense of politics, Revanth is a great orator. Just like KCR, Revanth can pull huge crowds. This was seen last year, during Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra.
His former TDP colleague Payyavula Keshav told The News Minute that more than becoming chief minister, Revanth wished to topple the gigantic Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS). This desire got stronger after he was caught red-handed handing a bribe to a government officer in 2015. He was sent to jail at the same time his only child was getting married. However, he was was permitted to attend the wedding for a few hours.
After coming out of Cherlapally prison, Revanth vowed to destroy KCR in his heartland. “My only agenda in life is to dethrone KCR and make his family irrelevant in politics,” he said to a rousing crowd who had come to receive him outside the jail premises.
Overcoming the infighting
In 2017, Revanth joined the Indian National Congress, which was at that time in bad shape nationwide, owing to the meteoric rise of BJP’s Narendra Modi. Over the last five years, Revanth built assumed a persona of being the only leader who could take on KCR in Telangana. Within a few years, he became the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee president.
During the Bharat Jodo Yatra, Revanth was projected as Telangana’s Congress face. “During the Bharat Jodo Yatra when we were planning which leaders should be visiting their constituency, everyone asked for Revanth Reddy,” a Karnataka Congress leader told The News Minute.
But it has not been a smooth sail. Many inside the Congress party do not agree with Revanth’s politics. The Komatireddy brothers, Venkat and Raj Gopal, do not like Revanth a lot. Uttam Kumar Reddy, former Congress state chief T Jayaprakash Reddy, and V Hanumantha Rao, who have held senior positions in the party before, were displeased with Revanth assuming the state chief’s role.
What eventually matters is that Congress was comprehensively able to defeat BRS under the leadership of Revanth Reddy, who is now ready to assume highest political role in the Telangana. According to reports, he will be sworn in as chief minister of the State on December 7.
