Hyderabad: BC Welfare Minister Ponnam Prabhakar questioned the BJP leadership for discriminating against BC candidates within the party, in wake of election for the post of BJP’s State unit president. He asked why the BC leaders were not allowed to file nominations.

During a press conference at Gandhi Bhavan, the Minister accused the saffron party over its ‘discriminatory approach’ towards BCs by not allowing BC leaders to contest in the party's internal polls. He questioned the party's commitment to social justice and wondered as to why despite having three BC MPs and several senior BC leaders, they were completely sidelined.

The Minister said that in the past, the BJP had made promises to make a BC leader the Chief Minister, but it had failed to honour those commitments. Referring to the leadership change in the State BJP ahead of the last Assembly elections, he said the party had removed BC leader Bandi Sanjay and replaced him with Union Minister G Kishan Reddy, further reflecting its disregard for backward classes.