Hyderabad: With the Supreme Court asking the Telangana Assembly to specify the ‘reasonable period’ for deciding disqualification pleas filed against the defecting BRS MLAs and posting the matter to February 10, speculation of by-poll has risen in the State as the party working president KT Rama Rao on Monday asked his leaders to get ready for the election. The BRS had approached the Supreme Court seeking disqualification of the party MLAs Tellam Venkat Rao, Kadiyam Srihari and Danam Nagender.

The SC bench of Justices BR Gavai and AG Masih listed the case on February 10 and asked senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi appearing on behalf of Telangana Assembly secretary, to get instructions from the Speaker.

The petitioners KP Vivekanand, Padi Kaushik Reddy (BRS) and A Maheshwar Reddy (BJP) had filed petition in the High Court contending that the delay in deciding the disqualification petition could give the ruling party a chance to enable more defections. Along with the three MLAs, seven other BRS MLAs also joined the ruling party.

The HC single bench in September last year had directed the Speaker to fix a schedule of hearing within four weeks to decide on the disqualification pleas. The division bench of the high court in November had set aside the judgment of the single bench and said that the Speaker should decide the disqualification petition within a reasonable time. Challenging this decision, Kaushik Reddy has approached the Supreme Court. The matter is slated to come up on February 10.

The party leaders are hopeful of a positive decision. They opined that the previous judgments of Maharashtra and Manipur would come in handy. KTR said that it was impossible for the Congress to shield the defectors anymore as the law laid down by the constitution and prior SC judgments were explicitly clear. “Let us be prepared to fight by-elections soon my fellow BRS party soldiers,” he said on his X account.