Telangana: TRS 'threatening' and 'purchasing' Congress MLAs, claims KC Khuntia

Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) has claimed that TRS is trying to remove Congress from the state to impress Prime Minister Narendra Modi for gaining ministerial berths.

Speaking to ANI, TPCC in-charge RC Khuntia claimed that TRS is "threatening" and "purchasing" Congress MLAs.

"How can Telangana Speaker combine 12 members and take a decision to merge CLP with TRS? Speaker cannot say that Congress party has merged with TRS," he said. "TRS is threatening and purchasing our MLAs."

He went to ask why TRS chief K Chandrasekhar Rao is purchasing MLAs from Telangana Congress when he has a clear majority.

"When KCR has a comfortable majority, why he is purchasing more MLAs? I think KCR's intention is to kill the opposition, maybe he wants to send a message to Modi that I have killed the opposition and finished Congress, so give me some ministries as a reward. He is doing all this probably to please Modi and to become a partner in Delhi," he claimed.

TPCC President Uttam Kumar Reddy claimed that the 12 Congress MLAs who approached the Speaker to join TRS in the state have been benefited by the ruling KCR government.

Reddy said, "We are going to Lok Pal with the case that these defected MLAs have been benefited by the state government for joining TRS. We have already filed a petition in High Court one month ago stating that Chief Minister Rao is playing the same tactics as he did in the last term when he purchased 12 TDP MLAs."

"On June 10, we are filing a separate writ petition with the High Court saying that the Speaker should first decide on the disqualification petitions. Speaker's order to merge defected MLAs with TRS should be set aside until then," he added.

Reddy asserted that the TPCC will approach the Supreme Court if the party doesn't get justice in the High Court.

"At every point of time, we have filed disqualification petition with the Speaker urging to disqualify the defected MLAs. Speaker, as per the law, is not allowed to take any petition from the defected MLAs till he takes a decision on the disqualification petition filed by us. The Speaker has kept disqualification petition pending with him and he is not meeting us, but he took a petition from the defected MLAs and said the MLAs are merged with TRS," he added.

The 12 MLAs had recently met the Speaker at his residence and submitted a memorandum claiming that the decision to merge with the TRS was taken at a meeting of the Congress Legislature Party (CLP). However, Uttam Kumar Reddy had rejected this claim.

-ANI