Hyderabad, Dec 4 (IANS) A meeting of the newly-elected MLAs of the Congress party began at a hotel in Telangana to elect their leader.

All 64 MLAs from across the state have reached Ellaa Hotel in Gachibowli for the meeting. Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar, who is the AICC observer, is attending the Congress Legislature Party (CLP) meeting along with other observers Deepa Das Munshi, Dr Ajoy Kumar, KJ George, K Muraleedharan and AICC General Secretary in-charge of Telangana Manikrao Thakare.

The AICC observers are expected to take the view of the MLAs and convey the same to the central leadership for a final decision. Party sources say the meeting is also likely to pass a resolution, requesting the party’s central leadership to name the leader.

Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) President A. Revanth Reddy is the front runner for the post and several newly-elected MLAs have openly supported him.

Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka, who was the CLP leader in the dissolved Assembly and former TPCC president Uttam Kumar Reddy are the other leaders in the race.

The Congress party bagged 64 seats in the 119-member Assembly. The party staked the claim for forming the government. A delegation of Congress leaders called on Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan at Raj Bhavan on Sunday night and staked claim for government formation.

The delegation, led by Thakre and Revanth Reddy presented a list of newly-elected party MLAs to the Governor.

Shivakumar said a meeting of newly-elected MLAs will be held on Monday. “We have a procedure in the Congress party. We will come out with the procedure and we will come back to you,” he told media persons after meeting with the Governor.