​Family politics: on the feud in the Bharat Rashtra Samithi

The decision by the Congress-led Telangana government to seek a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) inquiry into alleged irregularities related to the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project has triggered a feud in the family of Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) patriarch K. Chandrashekar Rao. Mr. Rao, the first Chief Minister of Telangana, who served two terms, is facing an uphill struggle for political survival after losing power to a resurgent Congress in 2023. K. Kavitha, his daughter, has publicly blamed her cousins — senior leader T. Harish Rao and former Member of Parliament J. Santosh Kumar — for her father’s plight. The two leaders have been known to be close to the patriarch as well as his son and anointed successor K.T. Rama Rao. Mr. Rao is not a novice and he knows better than to be misled by anyone else. Ms. Kavitha’s accusations are, hence, more about a tug of war within the family for inheritance and the spoils of power. Despite losing the Assembly election, she was given a party nomination as a Member of the Legislative Council (MLC), but she evidently thinks she deserved better. With her father, brother and cousins not willing to oblige her, Ms. Kavitha went public with the charges, and the party suspended her. Ms. Kavitha has resigned from the party and her position as an MLC.

Ms. Kavitha’s outburst against her father’s confidants may turn out to be politically suicidal for her. In fact, unrealistic political calculations run in the family, it appears, going by the senior Mr. Rao’s missteps ahead of the 2023 election. Claiming a national role for himself, he had changed the party’s name to the BRS — paradoxical for a leader and a party that had little more than regionalism as its key source of legitimacy. Far from realising any national role in the 2024 general election, Mr. Rao found the ground falling out from under his feet and corruption charges swirling around him. In May 2025, Ms. Kavitha had reportedly questioned her father’s muted position with regard to the Bharatiya Janata Party. Her exit from the BRS marks a sign of crisis for a regional outfit that frittered its promise too soon. With a resourceful and dynamic State under its rule, the BRS and the Rao family could have left behind a stellar legacy in governance and development. By reducing electoral and organisational politics to crass power bargains and transactions, the BRS did itself and the new State considerable damage. In politics, a second chance is always possible for leaders and parties. But, as of now, the BRS stands diminished.