Hyderabad, Sept.16 (Maxim News): Senior TDP leader and former Andhra Pradesh Assembly Speaker Dr Kodela Sivaprasada Rao allegedly committed suicide at his home in Banjara Hills here on Monday. His family members immediately rushed him to Basavatarakam Indo-American Cancer Hospital in Banjara Hills. He was 72.
However, the hospital authorities said the former AP Speaker died of heart attack. The doctors are said to have tried their best to save him, but Kodela reportedly died of cardiac arrest after his failed suicide attempt. Kodela reportedly fell sick last week and was admitted in his own hospital for a heart ailment in Guntur. After treatment, he had come back to Hyderabad. The Banjara Hills police visited the residence of Kodela Sivaprasada Rao in Banjara Hills and reportedly registered a case of suicide. Kodela’s body has been sent to the Osmania Hospital for post-mortem amid tight security.
Kodela joined the TDP in 1983 when late N T Rama Rao founded the party. He is survived by two sons and a daughter. Kodela, who was born in 1947 in a farmer’s family, had completed his primary education in Siripuram Village in Guntur district. He studied pre-university course at Loyola College, Vijayawada. He graduated with M.B.B.S from Guntur Medical College, Kurnool and got his MS (General Surgery) from Banaras Hindu University. A doctor by profession, Kodela joined the Telugu Desam Party when it was founded by NT Rama Rao in 1983.
Kodela became Speaker in 2014 after bifurcation of then Andhra Pradesh to create Telangana State. The six-time MLA Kodela had won from Narsaraopet for five times and Sattenapalli in 2014. He also served as Home Minister and Panchayat Raj minister. He lost to YSR Congress Party’s Ambati Rambabu in the 2019 elections. In his 35-year political career, Kodela served as a minister in NTR and N Chandrababu Naidu cabinets and held important portfolios like Home, Health, Major Irrigation, Panchayati Raj, Civil Supplies, before being appointed as the first Speaker after AP was bifurcated in 2014.
Kodela has been under severe stress after a series of cases filed against him and his family members, including the infamous Assembly furniture theft case, which has been haunting him. (Maxim News)
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