HYDERABAD: The next president of Pradesh Congress Committee will be from the Andhra region.The Congress high command has come to a decision on this and is examining who, between two front runners housing minister Kanna Lakshminarayana and transport minister Botsa Satyanaryana, fits the bill better. Both belong to the Kapu community which is numerically strong in coastal districts. The announcement on appointment of the new PCC chief is likely to be made in the next four to five days, according to sources.Now that the decision has been taken to appoint someone from Andhra as PCC president, the deputy chief minister’s post will go to a leader from Telangana. Already, higher education minister Damodar Rajanarasimha is considered to be the party’s hot favourite for the post.Though chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy reportedly wanted the PCC president to be from Telangana, the central leadership appears to have the interests of the party in coastal Andhra uppermost in its mind in the wake of the humiliating defeat YS Jagan Mohan Reddy had inflicted on the Congress in the by-elections and his efforts to emerge as a major threat to the Congress in Andhra and Rayalaseema.AICC general secretary and AP Congress affairs in-charge Ghulam Nabi Azad is understood to have discussed with party president Sonia Gandhi on Thursday the appointment of PCC chief, deputy chief minister and Assembly speaker, and finalisation of dates for effecting a formal merger of the PRP with the Congress. Congress leaders will discuss the matter with PRP’s C Ramachandraiah who has been asked to rush to Delhi. Meanwhile, Telangana MPs, who appeared to have been rattled by the violence in Karimnagar on Wednesday, are veering to the conclusion that they should do something dramatic or they will be forced to go into political exile. They are planning to go on an indefinite hunger strike after June 15. If the party does not respond positively even then, they will resign as a last resort.
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