With a Delhi court exonerating her in the alleged liquor policy case, former Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) MLC K Kavitha now finds herself at a political crossroads yet again, months ahead of the launch of her new party.
“Satyameva Jayate,” Kavitha said shortly after the order, thanking the judiciary “for seeing through the web of lies” in what she termed as a politically motivated case. “The judiciary has cut through the web of lies,” she said at a press conference in Hyderabad, adding: “Who will be held accountable for the time I lost when I was in jail?”
The daughter of former Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao, popularly known as KCR, Kavitha had been accused of being a key member of the alleged “South Group” that orchestrated the payment of Rs 100 crore to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in exchange for liquor licences under the now-scrapped Delhi excise policy. She spent a little over five months in prison before being granted bail.
“Life-changing” jail stint
Those close to her say the stint in jail marked a turning point in her life. “The case was politically motivated to target then CM KCR but it was Kavitha who went to jail. This seems to have changed her internally,” a source said.
After her release, Kavitha largely focused on grassroots meetings through her NGO, Telangana Jagruthi. In April 2025, she wrote to her father saying he “should have targeted the BJP more” during his speech at the BRS silver jubilee meeting in Elkathurthy. “I am saying this perhaps because I was the one who suffered the most (under BJP),” she wrote in a letter, which was later “leaked”.
The episode deepened rifts within the family as Kavitha publicly criticised her brother, K T Rama Rao, and cousin T Harish Rao saying, “KCR is like god but he is surrounded by demons.” She was issued a show-cause notice for anti-party remarks and subsequently resigned from the primary membership of the BRS.
Earlier this month, she announced plans to float her own party and is expected to formally launch it in May. Kavitha has also said she intends to field candidates in the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) elections, the dates for which are yet to be announced.
On Friday, Kavitha thanked her parents, in-laws and children for standing by her. “I sought my mother’s blessings after the court order,” she said, without naming either KCR or KTR.
Sources close to her said that she has distanced herself from the Kalvakuntla family and wants to remain that way despite the “resounding legal victory”.
Reconciliation on the cards?
KTR, however, struck a conciliatory note in a post on X saying that the AAP government led by Arvind Kejriwal was brought down in the name of the “so-called liquor scam” and that the “political casualty of that narrative was the BRS” in the 2023 Assembly elections and 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
“Kavitha garu got justice in court today and in the same manner, every case registered against our leaders will be conclusively exposed as false, politically motivated and fabricated…,” he wrote.
However, sources close to Kavitha dismissed the possibility of reconciliation. “A post cannot change what has transpired between them. Kavitha ji was the scapegoat in this entire episode,” a source said.
Responding to KTR’s post, Kavitha accused him of attempting to blame her and the case for the BRS’s electoral losses. “You are living in denial, my dear brother. Learn from the people what really caused the BRS’s loss,” she said, adding that the party had failed to defend her during what she described as “the vilest” social media campaigns against her. “They had morphed my pictures placing liquor bottles on my head instead of Bathukamma flowers. No one from the BRS social media team reacted. KCR and KTR did not hold press conferences to condemn the arrest and bring out the truth. Now blaming me for the electoral loss of BRS is not fair,” she said.
Now one of the sharpest critics of the BRS, Kavitha has broadened her attack to include the Congress and BJP. “She has been rallying against the rot in BRS, Congress and the BJP,” a source said, adding that the court order has only strengthened her resolve.