Why CM Kiran ignoring his cabinet colleagues?

Why is Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy indifferent towards his cabinet colleagues?

One can observe a drastic change in the attitude of Chief Minister after returning from New Delhi. PCC chief Botsa Satyanarayana, who developed a grouse against Kiran Reddy, is now going hand in hand with him. About five Cabinet colleagues of Kiran met Botsa on Thursday and expressed their anguish over the way the Chief Minister was taking decisions unilaterally. The dissidents include Deputy Chief Minister Damodara Rajanarasimha, ministers K Jana Reddy, Vatti Vasantha Kumar and D L Ravindra Reddy.  The number of ministers raising a banner of revolt has reached to six with latest joining that is none other than Minister Raghuveera Reddy. 

Botsa reportedly has sent a report to the party high command on the growing dissidence in the party against the Chief Minister particularly the dissatisfaction expressed by a half-a-dozen ministers. The dissident ministers had alleged that the Chief Minister was taking decisions without consulting even with the cabinet colleagues. Now the latest who joined the bandwagon is Raghuveera Reddy. 

It became a hot topic in the Congress circles over series of news items appeared in a section of the press against Raghuveera Reddy on his business and new takeovers. The news raised many eyebrows as the newspaper in which the news appeared was owned by one of the supporters of the Chief Minister. The news reports highlighted that Raghuveera Reddy and his family members now entered into liquor trade apart from the existing businesses like farming, dairy and hospitality sectors. It also stated that Raghuveera’s family had a takeover of a bottling plant at Medchal and decided to establish another unit. 

Suspecting CM behind the news reports, the supporters of Raghuveera Reddy up in the ante against him. Raghuveera Reddy had been one among the trusted members of Kiran when the latter took the   reins of the State as Chief Minister. The gap widened between Raghuveera and Kiran of late as it is evident with his touch-me-not attitude. Earlier, he used to condemn the charges against the detractors of Kiran very often and now he was not in such activity. He was maintaining distance himself with Kiran. On the other hand, Kiran too was encouraging another minister Sailajanath, who also hails from Anantapur district. 

Botsa, who was acting as mediator between the dissident ministers and Kiran Kumar Reddy, is believed to be taking advantage of the situation and prepared a report on the party affairs and also growing dissidence among the Cabinet colleagues against the CM. 

However, political analysts have seen a sea change in the attitude of Kiran Reddy after his return from Delhi meeting with Sonia and other heads of AICC.  As a first move, Kiran had gone to his home district Chittoor to have a darshan of Lord Balaji in Tirumala and fulfilled his vow by tonsuring his head. He held a series of public meetings in different parts of the State by announcing schemes one or the other.  Mana Biyyam, Indiramma Kalalu, Amma Hastham and Bangarutalli are some of the schemes introduced by Kiran in a span of just 15 days. His supporters maintain that there are umpteen improvements in Kiran while addressing the public. 

For the first time, Kiran Kumar Reddy fired a salvo against Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) chief KCR saying that he has capacity to stop tremors created by him. KCR had said he would create tremors if the UPA government did not yield to his demand to give a separate statehood for Telangana. His authoritative public speeches are any indication for his increasing confidence levels as if he was given full powers by the AICC president Sonia Gandhi. Will the Centre replace Kiran as expected by the dissident ministers when the election mood is round the corner? If not, what will be their next move is to wait and watch.

-Sakshipost