Interview: Konda Vishweshwar Reddy, among BJP's wealthiest candidates, takes pride in cleaning Telangana school toilets

With family assets worth ₹ 4,568 crore, Konda Vishweshwar Reddy is the richest of all 525 candidates in the fray from 17 Lok Sabha seats of Telangana. He is also the wealthiest (BJP) candidate in the Lok Sabha Elections 2024 across the country.

A US-returnee entrepreneur, Reddy, won the in 2014 on a Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) ticket. He lost the seat in 2019 as a Congress candidate. Reddy is contesting the 2024 elections again from Chevella seat, on a BJP ticket.

Reddy, who has a masters in engineering from the United States, comes from an illustrious family of Telangana. The state’s Rangareddy district, part of the , is named after his grandfather Konda Venkata Ranga Reddy, the first deputy Chief Minister of united Andhra Pradesh. 

His father Konda Madhava Reddy was former Chief Justice of Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra High Courts. He is married to , daughter of Dr Pratap C Reddy, Founder and Chairman of . Sangitha owns bulk of the family wealth at ₹ 3,208 crore, as per the election affidavit filed by Reddy. 

Reddy is up against the Congress party's Member of Parliament (MP) G Ranjith Reddy (assets ₹435 crore) and BRS’s Kasani Gnaneshwar Mudiraj (assets ₹228 crore) in Chevella, where voting takes place on May 13 along with other Telangana seats in the of Lok Sabha Elections.

In an exclusive interview with LiveMint, Reddy talks about his third contest in Chevella, his switches between all three parties, the role of money and why Telangana is key for BJP’s and ’s mission south. Excerpts from the edited interview:

The BRS and the Congress have deceived Telangana. While the BRS has deviated from the ideals of Telangana agitation and focused solely on enriching a single family, the , in the last two terms, has enabled the