High drama ends peacefully

*Cong picks five out of 160 hopefuls *All five to file nominations today * Sixth Cong candidate to be announced today *TDP fields three candidates * Cong camp largely peaceful; TDP jolted While the high drama of selecting the Congress candidates for five MLC seats out of 160 applicants ended peacefully on Sunday evening with the PCC president Botcha Satyanarayana announcing the names, the dissension in TDP has reached a new high with Dadi Veerabhadra Rao, a sitting member, making caustic remarks against party president N Chandrababu Naidu. Also strong opposition was expressed against the selection of former minister Samantakamani in Anantapur district. The Congress candidates for the five MLC seats under MLA quota are sitting member Ponguleti Sudhakar Reddy (Khammam), former minister Mohd Shabbir Ali (Nizamabad), Anguri Lakshmi Sivakumari (East Godavari), T Santosh (Karimnagar) and K Veerabhadraswamy (Vizianagaram). They will be filing their nominations on Monday afternoon. Briefing media, Botcha said that the party had taken into consideration various aspects like regional and social equations before finalizing the names of the candidates. He said Shabbir Ali has been selected under minority quota and in view of the services he had rendered to the party. Lakshmi Sivakumari was selected under SC quota. She was sent to council under Governor's quota in the vacancy that arose following the death of Lakshmidevamma two years back. T Santosh is a BC and former DCC president from Karimnagar district. K Veerabhadraswamy is from Vizianagaram district. He is DCC in charge and belongs to Vysya community. He is also close to the PCC president. It is said that Botcha had insisted on his name. Of the five, Sudhakar Reddy, T Santosh and Mohd Shabbir Ali are from Telangana region and the remaining two are from coastal and north coastal Andhra. It is said that Rayalaseema region will get representation under Governor's quota. The names that are making rounds under Governor quota are those of K Satyanarayana Raju, Vani Rao, Dr Srinagi among others. Telugu Desam also formally announced its list on Sunday naming Yanamala Ramakrishnudu (East Godavari, BC), Samanthakamani (Anantaput, SC) and Saleem (Hyderabad, minority). Of the nine MLC seats, three candidates Lakshmisiva Parvati (Congress), Adireddy Apparao (YSRCP) and Y Ramakrishnudu (TDP) are from East Godavari district. All the three belong to BC community.As the Congress party would be left with about 14 excess votes, the party is contemplating to put up sixth candidate. The name of Premsagar Rao, outgoing MLC from Adilabad is under consideration according to a source. PCC president said a decision will be announced on Monday.It is learnt that Union minister of state K Chiranjeevi is unhappy over the names recommended by him being ignored.