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Congressman Vijayabhaskar Reddy dead

Syed Amin Jafri in Hyderabad

Veteran Congress leader and former chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, Kotla Vijayabhaskar Reddy, passed away in Hyderabad on Thursday.

The 81-year-old leader, ailing for quite some time, was undergoing treatment at the Apollo Hospital. He was in a critical condition for the last 10 days. His end came around 11.30 am.

Reddy is survived by wife K Syamala Devi, two sons and three daughters.

Reddy's condition deteriorated on September 25 when he developed multiple organ dysfunction. He was haemo-dynamically unstable despite having been on inotropic support.

Assisted mechanical ventilator support was provided but to no avail. He died of multiple organ dysfunction, Apollo Hospital spokesperson Sreenivasulu told rediff.com

Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, Governor Dr C Rangarajan, AP Congress Committee president M Satyanarayana Rao and Congress legislature party leader Dr Y S Rajasekhar Reddy condoled the leader's death.

Born on August 16, 1920, at Laddagiri in Kurnool district in the backward Rayalaseema region, Reddy graduated in Arts at Madanapalle and studied law in the Madras Law College during 1945-47.

He practiced law under K Umamaheswaram who later became a judge in the Andhra Pradesh High Court.

Active in politics from his schools days, Reddy had participated in the freedom struggle.

During the Quit India movement, he was severely beaten up by the police for organising a protest meeting and had to be hospitalised for three months.

In 1953, he shifted residence from Madras to Kurnool and was elected to the assembly in the erstwhile Andhra state in 1955.

During 1959-62, Reddy served as the first chairman of the Kurnool zilla parishad and was re-elected to the post in 1964.

He was finance minister in K Brahmananda Reddy's cabinet during 1967-71, while P V Narasimha Rao was the education minister. Reddy held many portfolios such as cooperation, major irrigation and finance.

In 1977, he was picked by Indira Gandhi to contest the Lok Sabha elections from Kurnool, his home constituency.

In September 1982, he was hand-picked by Indira Gandhi to take over as chief minister of Andhra Pradesh. However, when assembly elections were held, he could not prevent the drubbing by the Telugu Desam Party led by actor-turned-politician N T Rama Rao, which bagged over 200 seats and ousted Congress from power for the first time in Andhra Pradesh.

During his six-decade long innings in politics, Reddy held various positions in the APCC and was an AICC member since 1954. He had served on the Congress Working Committee and was also chairman of the All India Congress Committee Disciplinary Action Committee.

Elected to the Lok Sabha six times (between 1977 and 1998, barring once in 1984), Reddy was a Union minister thrice.

As a cabinet minister in the Indira Gandhi ministry in 1983-84, he held the shipping, transport and industry portfolios.

He served briefly in the Rajiv Gandhi as industry and company affairs minister but quit after losing the 1984 Lok Sabha polls.

Re-elected in June 1991, he was inducted into the P V Narasimha Rao ministry as minister for law, justice and company affairs.

At his invitation, Narasimha Rao entered the Lok Sabha through a by-election from Nandyal constituency in Kurnool district in 1991. Reddy ensured Rao's victory by a record margin of 580,297 votes.

Reddy later resigned from the Narasimha Rao cabinet in October 1992 to take over as chief minister of Andhra Pradesh for the second time.

However, the TDP again proved to be his nemesis. The Congress lost badly in the 1994 assembly elections.

Though he held important political positions, the trappings of power did not affect Reddy's image or style of functioning. He enjoyed a clean reputation and was never linked to any scandal, a rarity in Congress circles.

He was elected to the Congress Working Committee in 1992. After losing the 1999 Lok Sabha elections, he was nominated to the Central Election Committee of the AICC by Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

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