Eight newly elected BJP MLAs are unlikely to be sworn in at the Assembly when it meets on Saturday morning. Although a final decision is yet to be taken, the party MLAs-elect do not wish to be sworn in by the pro tem speaker and AIMIM leader Akbaruddin Owaisi, according to party sources on Friday.
The BJP MLAs-elect are expected to assemble at the State office at 7.30 a.m. on Saturday for a breakfast meeting with party State president and Union Minister for Tourism, Culture and Development of Northeast Region G. Kishan Reddy to finalise the strategy.
What is for sure is that the MLAs-elect will first offer prayers at the Bhagyalakshmi Temple at Charminar after the meeting and from there, they will proceed to the Martyr’s Memorial in front of the Assembly to pay homage. Whether they will go into the Assembly from there is yet to be known.
Party sources said if the party decides not to attend the inaugural of the maiden Assembly session of the present government, the MLAs-elect will wait for the Speaker to be elected by the Congress for being formally sworn in later.
Senior-most MLA-elect T. Raja Singh, who is tipped to become the legislature party leader, has already gone public about not wanting to be sworn in by Mr. Owaisi. The Goshamahal MLA-elect did the same when he was the lone BJP MLA elected in 2018 when the pro tem speaker was another AIMIM MLA Mumtaz Ahmed Khan, elected from Charminar constituency.
Mr. Raja Singh was the leader when two more party MLAs were elected in the bypolls – M. Raghunandan Rao from Dubbak and former Minister Eatala Rajender from Huzurabad. It was when he was suspended by the party last year for his intemperate comments against the minority community that Mr. Rajender functioned as the leader in the Assembly.
If the three-time winner from Goshamahal constituency is reappointed as the legislature party leader, this time he will be having a sizeable team, including a second-time MLA in A. Maheshwar Reddy from Nirmal constituency, who joined the party from the Congress earlier this year. Rest of the MLAs are first timers.
