Vijayawada: Senior Telugu Desam leader Yanamala Ramakrishnudu on Friday slammed Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy for reneging on his promise to get special category status (SCS) for Andhra Pradesh.
In a statement, the leader of opposition in Legislative Council took pot shots at Jagan Mohan Reddy for not raising the SCS issue with centre, despite promising to do so while campaigning for the 2019 assembly and Lok Sabha elections.
Ramakrishnudu charged the CM with mortgaging interests of the state, instead of getting special status for AP and securing assurances made by central government when it truncated Andhra Pradesh.
He alleged that Jagan Mohan Reddy has done so in exchange for waiver of cases lodged against him.
The senior TD leader claimed that their party supremo and former chief minister N. Chandrababu Naidu had pursued with centre special status for AP on several occasions. The centre finally replied to the TD chief that the 14th Finance Commission has advised against providing special category status to any state in the country.
Ramakrishnudu disclosed that at the time, centre promised to give a special financial package in lieu of special status. Following this, the then ruling TD accepted the special financial package.
However, when the centre later accorded special status to 11 states while denying the same to AP, Chandrababu Naidu differed with the centre and came out of the NDA, he added.
