AP Assembly speaker Thammineni Sitaram on Tuesday accepted the resignation of TDP MLA and former minister Ganta Srinivasa Rao. The speaker took the decision as the former minister had sent his resignation letter on February 12, 2021.
Srinivasa Rao also met the speaker in person and requested him to accept the resignation. As the resignation was in the speaker format and the MLA himself had requested the speaker in person, the speaker accepted the resignation.
It may be mentioned here that the state government had also written to the speaker to disqualify the four suspended MLAs and two MLCs for defecting to the party. The ruling YSRCP had sent a letter to the speaker requesting him to disqualify MLAs Anam Ramanarayana Reddy, Kotamreddy Sridhar Reddy, Mekapati Chandrasekhar Reddy and Undavalli Sridevi who were suspended from the party.
The party suspended these MLAs for anti-party activities during the Rajya Sabha elections. It was alleged that these four MLAs voted for the TDP candidate, Panchumarthi Anuradha, against the party whip.
As Rajya Sabha elections are due in March this year, the ruling party took the decision to write to the Assembly speaker and the council chairman seeking disqualification of the four MLAs and two MLCs.
Three members, C M Ramesh of BJP, Vemireddy Prabhakar Reddy of YSRCP and Kanakamedala Ravindra Kumar of the TDP are scheduled to retire in April this year. Elections to fill these three vacancies are expected to be held sometime in March this year.
The party also requested chairman of Legislative Council, Koyye Moshen Raju, to suspend two MLCs from the council for floor crossing. The party said that MLC, C Ramachandraiaha had joined the opposition TDP, while another MLC C Srinivasa Rao alias Vamsikrishna Yadav, joined the Jana Sena. The ruling YSRCP wanted the council chairman to disqualify the two members for floor crossing.
