Politics can be cruel. In the political battlefield, ties of mother, father, uncle, daughter, or son-in-law vanish; what matters most are interests. That is exactly what K Kavitha, daughter of KCR, is experiencing today.
Once a key figure in the BRS, she has now become the target of her own party cadre. Leaders and workers accuse her of handing weapons to political rivals and tarnishing the party’s image.
Two days ago, acting on the directions of BRS chief K Chandrashekar Rao, Kavitha was suspended from the party. The very next day, she resigned from both her BRS primary membership and her MLC post, severing ties with the party completely.
In this backdrop, the BRS leadership has gone one step further by changing Kavitha’s surname. She is now being referred to as Devanapalli Kavitha — adopting the surname of her husband, Anil Kumar Devanapalli.
Until now, Kavitha had built her political identity with the surname “Kalvakuntla,” inherited from her father’s family. But as family disputes turned political, BRS leaders have launched counter-attacks by disassociating her from the “Kalvakuntla” legacy.
The message from the BRS is clear: Kavitha no longer belongs to the Kalvakuntla family in political terms; henceforth, she must carry her marital surname if she wants to pursue politics.
A similar precedent was seen earlier with Y S Sharmila. After she politically parted ways with her brother, Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy, the YSRCP leadership distanced itself from her.
Though her husband Anil Kumar’s surname is “Morusupalli,” Sharmila continues to use her father YSR’s name and legacy.
YSRCP leaders, however, have been telling cadres that Sharmila is “not Y S Sharmila, but Morusupalli Sharmila,” as they see her moves as damaging to Jagan’s political standing.
