Hyderabad: Independent candidate Karne Shireesha, known widely as barrelakka (buffalo sister) in Telangana, finished fourth in the race for the state’s Kollapur assembly seat, winning all of 5,754 votes. The seat was won by Jupally Krishna Rao of the Congress, who won 93,609 votes and defeated his closest rival — Harshavardhan Reddy of the BRS — by nearly 30,000 votes.
Kollapur’s result was keenly awaited because of the huge interest in Shireesha, 26, who became a symbol of youth discontent against the ruling BRS government over the issue of jobs, even though she didn’t have much influence in her constituency.
She rose to fame after a reel she posted two years ago went viral. It featured her with four buffaloes, which she claimed her family had bought for her as a source of income since “KCR (chief minister K. Chandrashekar Rao) had not issued any notifications for government jobs”.
Shireesha alleged she faced threats and a police probe over the video, which got extensive coverage in the mainstream media and on YouTube channels.
Evidence of the people’s curiosity about her lies in the fact that Shireesha’s election affidavit was downloaded from the Election Commission website 7,093 times (as of 11 pm Friday). In comparison, former minister Krishna Rao’s affidavit was accessed 304 times, and Reddy’s 188 times.
Even CM KCR’s affidavit in Gajwel was downloaded 3,541 times.
In Shireesha’s affidavit, the words ‘nil’ and ‘not applicable’ are the answers to questions on properties, tax returns, goods and services tax dues, and so on. But there’s one exception — the column about pending criminal cases.
A case was registered by the Telangana Police against Shireesha in 2022 for her video.
Allotted the vigil symbol, the Independent candidate campaigned with the help of a band of young supporters and a sum of Rs 1 lakh reportedly received from former Puducherry minister Malladi Krishna Rao.
Shireesha was provided security on the orders of the Telangana High Court after she approached it about an alleged attack on her brother, which she attributed to her “fight”, and accused police of inaction.
A commerce graduate, Shireesha said she entered the contest “as a representative of unemployed youth aspiring for good government jobs in the state”.
Located near the Andhra Pradesh border in south Telangana, Kollapur is a parched area, dependent on agriculture. It is under the Nagarkurnool Lok Sabha seat. The Congress has dominated the seat in most elections.
With a total of 2,29,580 registered voters, Kollapur recorded a voting percentage of 81.42 Thursday, according to Election Commission data.
(Edited by Nida Fatima Siddiqui)