Kalvakuntla Chandrashekar Rao (born 17 February 1954), abbreviatedKCR,[1] is the first and the current Chief Minister of the Indian state ofTelangana. He is the president of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi, a Regional Party in India.[2] He is a Member of the Legislative Assembly from the Gajwelconstituency of Medak District Telangana. Previously, he served as theMember of the Legislative Assembly from Siddipet and also as the Member of Parliament from Mahbubnagar and Karimnagar.[3] He took oath as the first Chief Minister of the new state of Telangana on 2 June 2014.

Early life
Rao was born on 17 February 1954 in Chintamadaka village, Siddipet Mandal, Medak District of Telangana (Previous AP)[4] in a Velama[5] He attained aMasters degree in Telugu Literature from Osmania Arts College-Osmania University, Hyderabad.[6]

Congress Party
KCR started his career with the youth Congress party in Medak district, controlled by Sanjay Gandhi in the 1970s.
Telugu Desam Party
KCR joined the TDP in 1983 and contested against A.Madan Mohan and lost that election. He won four consecutive Assembly elections from Siddipet between 1985 and 1999. From 1987-1988, he worked as Minister of Drought & Relief in Mr N. T. Ramarao's cabinet. In 1990, he was appointed as TDP convener for Medak, Nizamabad and Adilabad districts. In 1996, he worked as Transport minister in Mr Chandrababau Naidu's cabinet. He also served as the deputy speaker of the Andhra Pradesh Assembly from 2000-2001.[7]
Telangana Rashtra Samithi
Further information: Separate Telangana state movement

In the Elections of 2014, Rao announced the first Member of the Legislative Assembly candidate of Telangana Rashtra Samithi from Armoor, Telangana toAsannagari Jeevan Reddy. This was the first ever announcement of MLA candidates for 2014 elections by any political party in Telangana. Soon after, he became the first Chief Minister of Telangana by winning 63 out of 119 Assembly seats including Armoor. The party also won 11 of the 17 Lok Sabha seats in the state.[10]On 27 April 2001, Rao resigned as Deputy Speaker and TDP MLA.[8] He claimed that the politicians of the region were being suppressed and believed that separate state is the only solution.[9] In April 2001, he formed the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) to campaign for his separatist agenda.[8]
In the elections of 2004, Rao won the Siddipet state assembly constituency and also the Karimnagar Lok Sabha constituency, both as a TRS candidate.The TRS fought the 2004 general elections in alliance with the Indian National Congress and Rao was one of the five TRS candidates who were returned as MPs.[11]
TRS was part of the United Progressive Alliance coalition government, led by Congress. The party later withdrew from the coalition, saying that the Alliance was not minded to support a separate Telangana state.[12]In 2004, he fought the Lok Sabha polls and went on to become a Union Cabinet minister of Labour and Employment in the UPA-1 government at the Centre. He resigned in 2006.[7] In 2009, Rao fought and won the Mahbubnagar Lok Sabha by election for the TRS,the party fought the general elections as part of the opposition coalition led by TDP. In 2014, Elected as MLA from Gajwel Constituency of Medak Dist of Telangana State with a majority of 19218 and as MP from Medak Constituency with a majority of 397029 on 16-5-2014. In Telangana, the TRS, which led the campaign for a separate State for more than a decade, emerged victorious by winning 11 of the 17 Lok Sabha seats and 63 of the 119 Assembly seats, and emerged as the party with the largest vote share.[13] KCR was sworn in as the first chief minister of the Telangana state at 12.57 pm on 2 June, the day when the new state will be born. Rao, a staunch believer in astrology, numerology and Vaastu, is learnt to have fixed this time for his coronation as per the advice of priests to suit his lucky number ‘six’.[14][15]
Personal life[edit]

Kalvakuntla Chandrashekhar Rao is married to Shobha and has two children.[6] His son, K. T. Rama Rao, is a legislator fromSircilla, Karimnagar district, Telangana and is the cabinet minister for IT & Panchayat Raj Departments. His daughter,Kalvakuntla Kavitha, is M.P. from Nizamabad, Telangana . His nephew, Harish Rao, is MLA for the Siddipet constituency and is now the cabinet minister for Irrigation, Legislative Affairs and Marketing in the Telangana government.