Hyderabad/New Delhi: Telangana Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy has travelled to Delhi for key discussions with the Congress high command on the political future of Danam Nagender, following the Khairatabad Assembly seat being declared vacant.
The talks are reportedly centred on whether the party should field Nagender again as its candidate in the likely Khairatabad bypoll, and whether he should be accommodated as a minister.
The Telangana Assembly Secretary, Tirupathi, issued a gazette notification on September 26 declaring the seat vacant. This followed the Telangana High Court’s September 18 order disqualifying Nagender as an MLA. The court held that he lost his eligibility from April 23, 2024, and directed that the seat be treated as vacant from that date. An election to the constituency is now expected in the near future.
Nagender won Khairatabad in the 2023 Assembly elections as a BRS candidate. He later joined the Congress and contested the 2024 Lok Sabha elections from Secunderabad on a Congress ticket, but lost. Since he contested as an MP candidate without resigning as an MLA elected on a BRS ticket, the BRS filed a defection petition against him in the High Court, which led to his disqualification.