In the recently held assembly elections in Telangana, the oldest political party of India, i.e., Indian National Congress (INC) won 64 seats out of 119 seats of the state assembly. With this clear majority, the Congress party is all set to form government in another state of south India, after Karnataka.
On Tuesday, the Congress party announced that the next chief minister of the state will be Revanth Reddy, who’s the current Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) chief of the state too. Under his leadership and face, the party fought elections in Telangana.
While addressing a press conference, party’s organisation General Secretary KC Venugopal said, “Congress President Shri Mallikarjun Kharge has decided to go with Revanth Reddy as the new CLP of the Telangana Legislative Party. The Congress will deliver a clean and able government that will provide maximum governance.”
“The swearing-in ceremony of new Telangana CM will be held on December 7. More details will be announced soon,” he added.
So who’s Revanth Reddy and how his political journey evolved from being a student activist to now being the chief minister of a state, let us try to figure this out.
Association with ABVP, TDP
During his student days, Revanth Reddy was associated with Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the student organisation of the RSS. He contested the local body elections as an independent candidate in 2006 and was elected member of the Zilla Parishad.
During this tenure he met Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief N. Chandrababu Naidu, and eventually he became a part of the party. In 2009, Revanth contested his first assembly election on a TDP ticket and won by over six thousand votes. Revanth, who contested from Kodangal seat, became MLA for the first time by defeating five-time Congress MLA Gurunath Reddy.
Strong position at Kodangal
In the assembly elections held in 2014 before the formation of Telangana, Revanth once again became the TDP candidate from Kodangal seat. Once again he defeated Gurunath Reddy, who was a TRS candidate this time. In the 2014 assembly elections, Revanth had won by a margin of 14,614 votes.
After this, TDP made Revanth the leader of the Telangana Assembly. However, on 25 October 2017, TDP dismissed Revanth from the post after it was revealed that he was going to join Congress. Ultimately, on 31 October 2017, Revanth became a member of the Congress party.
Entry to Congress
On 20 September 2018, he was appointed one of the three working presidents of the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee. In the 2018 Telangana Assembly Elections, Revanth contested from Kodangal seat for the third time. This time, Revanth, who contested the elections as a Congress candidate, suffered his first defeat at the hands of BRS’s Patnam Narendra Reddy.
After his defeat, Revanth tried his luck in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Revanth is among the three Congress Lok Sabha MPs from Telangana who won the elections in 2019. The Congress candidate from Malkajgiri seat defeated TRS’s M Rajasekhara Reddy in a close contest by more than 10 thousand votes.
Revanth got a bigger responsibility in June 2021, when Congress made him the president of its Telangana state unit.
Now, he is all set to become the chief minister of Telangana after securing a sliding victory for his party in the 2023 state assembly elections.
