Who is Chennamaneni Ramesh, the four-time BRS MLA stripped of his Indian citizenship?
In a shocking development, a four-time MLA from Telangana has been stripped of his Indian citizenship. Chennamaneni Ramesh, who is a former four-time Telangana Rashtra Samithi (now Bharat Rashtra Samithi) MLA representing Vemulawada constituency in Telangana, was stripped of his Indian citizenship after the Telangana High Court found that he is a German citizen.
Who is Chennamaneni Ramesh
The 68-year-old Ramesh, son of communist leader Rajeshwara Rao and nephew of former Maharashtra governor C. Vidyasagar Rao, was born in undivided Andhra Pradesh's Karimnagar, which is now a part of Telangana.
German citizenship
Ramesh moved to Germany for higher studies and did his M.Sc. (Agriculture) at Leipzig, and Ph.D. from Humboldt University of Berlin. He acquired German citizenship in 1993, and his wife is also a German national.
How his citizenship landed in trouble
However, Ramesh returned to India in 2008 and re-applied for Indian citizenship. He contested his first assembly election for the TDP in 2009 and won.
Ramesh's Indian citizenship came under the spotlight when Congress leader Adi Srinivas, whom he defeated in the polls, questioned it in court.
Srinivas argued that although Ramesh was granted Indian citizenship again, he continued to hold a German passport.
Ramesh＊s 2010 election in a by-poll was nullified in 2013 by the then Andhra Pradesh High Court, but he managed to get a stay order from the Supreme Court.
In December 2017, the Union government cancelled Ramesh's citizenship, but the Hyderabad High Court directed the MHA to re-examine the matter based on his appeal.
Ramesh also successfully contested the 2018 assembly elections but was denied a ticket in 2023 due to the pending citizenship case.
What Telangana High Court said?
The Telangana High Court, which held that Ramesh was indeed a German citizen, also imposed a fine of Rs 30 lakhs on him for falsifying documents and concealing facts about his German citizenship.
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