Kadiyam Srihari

Kadiyam Srihari (born 8 July 1952) is an Indian politician is currently the MLA from the Ghanpur Station Assembly constituency. He also served as the Deputy Chief Minister of Telangana and Minister for Education of Telangana from 2014 to 2018. He was also an MLC in the Telangana Legislative Council. He was a member of the Lok Sabha, representing the Warangal constituency from 2014-2015.

In the 2023 Telangana Legislative Assembly elections, Kadiyam contested as a member of the BRS party, from the Ghanpur Station Assembly Constituency and won the seat. He later joined the Congress party on 31 March 2024.

Personal life
Kadiyam Srihari was born in Parvathagiri, a village in the Warangal district. He attended Zilla Parishad High School in Warangal and, then was awarded a B.Sc. from the Arts and Science College in the same city. In 1975, he got a M.Sc. from Osmania University, Hyderabad.

He is married to K. Vinaya Rani, and has 3 daughters with her. One of his daughters, Kavya Srihari is also a politician. She changed parties from the BRS to the Indian National Congress along with him, on 31 March 2024.

He was a manager for Syndicate Bank in Nizamabad, where he worked from 1975 until 1977. He then became a teacher, working as a junior lecturer between 1977 and 1987. During this period, he served as the District President for the Government Junior Lecturers Association in Warangal and also as the State Secretary for the same body in Andhra Pradesh.

Political career
Srihari entered politics in February 1987 when he was asked by N. T. Rama Rao to join the Telugu Desam Party and contest for the position of mayor of Warangal Municipal Corporation. He served as chairman for the Kakatiya Urban Development Authority, Warangal in 1988. He was the district president for TDP in Warangal from 1987 to 1994.

Srihari won a seat as a MLA from Station Ghanpur constituency in 1994. He served as a minister in the cabinet of Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao, handling at various times the portfolios of Marketing, Social Welfare, Education and Irrigation in the Cabinets of both Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao and Nara Chandrababu Naidu.

In 2004, Srihari lost the general election contest in Station Ghanpur to TRS floor leader Dr. G. Vijayrama Rao of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi. He won a by-election from the same constituency in 2008.

He played a crucial role in getting the pro-Telangana letter from the TDP party and also represented TDP in an all-party meeting held in New Delhi.

Srihari announced his resignation from the TDP at Warangal on 11 May 2013, expressing displeasure over the party's ambivalent stand on the Telangana statehood issue. He formally joined the TRS, which supported statehood for the Telangana region, on 15 May 2013. He served as the Member of Parliament from Warangal Parliamentary Constituency and later took oath as a cabinet minister in Telangana government on 25 January 2015 as a deputy chief minister and education minister.

He is a politburo member in the TRS state committee and also chairman of training classes programmer for Telangana cadre. He is the chairman of TRS manifesto committee and played a crucial role in representing the aspirations of various sectors of people.

He was chosen as deputy chief minister and education minister of the state of Telangana on 25 January 2015. He served until 12 December 2018.

On 11 June 2015, he resigned as a Lok Sabha MP as he was elected as a member of the legislative council (MLC) and as a ministry in Telangana government. He served in the position from 2015 until 2023.

In the 2023 Telangana Legislative Assembly elections, he defeated Indira Singapuram of INC by 7779 votes, to become the MLA for the Ghanpur (Station) Assembly Constituency. He switched parties and joined the Indian National Congress on 31 March 2024, in the presence of Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy and AICC in-charge Deepa Dasmunshi.

Positions held

 * Minister for Irrigation, United Andhra Pradesh
 * Minister for Social Welfare, United Andhra Pradesh
 * Minister for Education, Telangana and United Andhra Pradesh
 * Minister for Marketing, United Andhra Pradesh (1995-2004)
 * Deputy CM of Telangana