Senior TDP leader Kadiyam Srihari quits party

HYDERABAD: Senior TDP leader and politburo member Kadiyam Srihari on Saturday quit the party expressing displeasure over a host of issues, including the party's ambivalent stand on the Telangana statehood issue.

Srihari, once a lecturer, had been with the TDP since its inception and served as an MLA for four terms. He was also a minister in the Chandrababu Naidu Cabinet in the late 1990s.

"The TDP has completely failed the people and lost its credibility. Only cash-rich industrialists were getting prominence in the party at the cost of sincere workers," Srihari alleged at a media conference in his hometown Warangal.

Srihari, who represented the TDP at the all-party meeting in New Delhi on Telangana, said the party was not respecting the sentiments of people of the region.

Srihari, who lost the Assembly elections in 2004 and 2009, had been sulking for sometime now. He met party chief Chandrababu Naidu after the latter concluded his 208-day foot march and dismissed reports that he was quitting the party.

However, he announced his resignation on Saturday but did not indicate his future plans.