K. T. Rama Rao

Kalvakuntla Taraka Rama Rao (born 24 July 1976), commonly known as KTR, is an Indian politician and Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) of Telangana Legislative Assembly.

He is a former Minister for Municipal Administration and Urban Development, Industries and Commerce, and Information Technology, Electronics and Communications of Telangana.

He represents Sircilla assembly constituency in the Telangana Legislative Assembly, he is also the working president of the Bharat Rashtra Samithi.

He is the son of K. Chandrashekar Rao, former Chief Minister of Telangana and the founder of Telangana Rashtra Samithi (now Bharat Rashtra Samiti).

K. T. Rama Rao was born in the Karimnagar district of Telangana (erstwhile Andhra Pradesh), India, on 24 July 1976.

His father, K. Chandrashekhar Rao, founded the Telangana Rashtra Samithi political party and is currently the 1st Chief Minister of Telangana.

His mother K. Shobha Rao, is a home maker.

His younger sister, K. Kavitha, is a former Member of Parliament in the Lok Sabha for the Nizamabad constituency.

At the age of ten, he moved to Hyderabad and joined the Amravati Public School at Yousufguda before shifting to Nalanda Public School at Mehdipatnam.

He completed his Schooling at St. George's Grammar School, Abids Road.

Further, he pursued Intermediate from Vignan Junior College, Vadlamudi, Guntur District, and went on to graduate with a BSc in Microbiology, Chemistry and Botany from Nizam College, a constituent College of Osmania University at Hyderabad.

He holds two Post-Graduate degrees—MSc in Bio-Technology from University of Pune and Master of Business Administration in Marketing and E-Commerce from Baruch College, a constituent College of the City University of New York.

During 1998–99, Rao began his stint as an IT professional and interned at the shipping and ocean logistics firm INTTRA Inc on Madison Avenue, New York, United States.

Rao is married to Shailima.

The couple has two children – son Himanshu Rao and daughter Alekhya Rao.

Rao began his political career in 2009 when he contested the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly Elections from the Sircilla Assembly constituency.

He won by a close margin of 171 votes, defeating independent candidate K. K. Mahender Reddy.

Soon after, Rao and 10 other members from the TRS resigned from the Legislative Assembly in support of a separate State for Telangana.

In July 2010, the High Court of Andhra Pradesh ordered the Election Commission of India to conduct by-polls in Sircilla and Vemulawada among other towns across the Telangana region.

Rao contested again from Sircilla and again defeated K. K. Mahender Reddy (now with the Indian National Congress (INC)), this time with a margin of 68,219 votes.

He held Rail Roko agitation after police and paramilitary forces were deployed by the Kiran Kumar Reddy government to control the ongoing situation.

On 27 January 2013, Rao courted arrest when he attempted to participate in the 'Samara Deeksha' (protest) at Indira Park in Hyderabad.

Rao demanded that a Bill be introduced in Parliament in an interview to a National News Channel.

He also declared that the impending "Telangana government will not compromise on any aspect of administration being delegated to the union government with regard to (the city of) Hyderabad."

Finally, the first Legislative Assembly elections for Telangana, the 29th state of the Indian Union, were held on 30 April 2014 (which also coincided with the 2014 General Elections) Rao contested as the MLA candidate for TRS from Sircilla against Konduri Ravider Rao from the INC, winning the seat for the third consecutive time by a margin of 53,004 votes.

TRS emerged as the ruling party with the single largest majority in the assembly, winning a decisive mandate of 66 out of 119 seats.

On 2 June 2014, Rao was sworn in as a Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) for Telangana, and Cabinet Minister for Information Technology and Panchayat Raj.

He was appointed as Executive Working President of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi Party (TRS) by the President and Chief Minister Kalvakuntla Chandrashekhar Rao.

In the 2023 Telangana Assembly elections, KT Rama Rao officially submitted his nominations at the RDO office located in Sircilla.

He served as a minister in various portfolios from 2014-2023 -

Soon after assuming office, Information Technology (IT) Minister K. T. Rama Rao briefed the Chief Minister on large-scale projects for a progressive Hyderabad in a review meeting of the Information Technology and Investment Region (ITIR) Policy.

In December 2014, along with the Telangana State Industrial Infrastructure Corporation (TSIIC) Chairman, Rao held discussions with the CEO of Smart City in Dubai with regard to developing Hyderabad under the ambit of ITIR.

Rama Rao has been awarded Most Inspirational Icon of the Year 2015 by CNN-IBN and Ritz Magazine.

Rao also called on Yusuff Ali M A, chairman of the Abu Dhabi-based Lulu Group who said that his company would invest Rs 2,500 crore in Telangana's FMCG domain for 2015–16.

During the same time, Rama Rao visited the Sonapur camp in Dubai to interact with about 20,000 migrant workers from Telangana who resided there.

In May 2015, Rao led an IT department delegation on a two-week tour to the United States with the agenda of discussing and reaching partnerships with corporate giants on various areas of collaboration with the Government of Telangana.

The top brass of 30 leading companies which include John Chambers of Cisco, Mark Hurd of Oracle and John Veihmeyer, the global chairman of KPMG, met Rao to discuss the new industrial policy and ease of doing business in Telangana.

He met Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadella, and Amazon executives Monique Meche & John Schoettler who assured their continued support to the State's initiatives in the IT space.

The Minister had also exhorted Non Resident Indians in a meeting at Seattle to be Goodwill Ambassadors in representation of the state government outside India.

He set up the largest start-up incubator, T-Hub on 5 November 2015.