Soon after 12 Congress MLAs met Assembly Speaker Pocharam Srinivas Reddy seeking merger of the group with the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS), Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee Chief Uttam Kumar Reddy said that the party will be heading to the High Court tomorrow and will also hold 36 hours long fast starting June 8. He said that if they do not get sufficient remedy, they will approach the Supreme Court.
While talking to ANI, Uttam Kumar Reddy said, "The Speaker has not withheld the dignity of his office. We tried to contact him by every means but he wasn't available for us. But in some secret place the Speaker took some representation from defected Congress MLAs against whom disqualification notices under anti-defection law are pending with him, and announced merger of Congress Legislature Party. Can anything be more disgraceful?"
He added, "We are going to Telangana High Court tomorrow and if we don't get sufficient remedy, we will go to the Supreme Court. We will also be filing cases in the Lokpal with evidence of MLAs benefiting out of changing parties. We are going on a 36 hour fast on June 8."
The 12 MLAs had 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 rejected this.
Reddy said the defector MLAs cannot claim to have convened a Legislature Party meeting without his permission. "The Congress will fight it democratically, we are looking for the Assembly Speaker since morning, he is missing. You people help us in finding him," he said.
Meanwhile, another party MLA Pilot Rohithreddy from Thandur constituency has resigned from the party and was likely to join the TRS. He was suspended from TRS last year after which he joined the Congress. He won the election from Tandur.
Uttam Kumar Reddy, who was elected to Lok Sabha recently, has also resigned from Huzurnagar Assembly constituency.
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