Jagan Mohan Reddy avoids Sharad Pawar’s call, keeps cards close to chest

Vijayawada: YSR Congress Party chief Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy appears to be keeping all his options open and also holding cards close to his chest. It is reliably learnt that Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar, on behalf of the UPA, tried to contact Mr Reddy but the latter could not be reached. It seems he is not ready to open any channel of communication yet and wants to maintain status quo till the results are out on May 23.

This comes after a majority of exit polls predicted that his party will get the most number of Lok Sabha seats and can play a bigger role in case the results throw up a hung Parliament. Sharad Pawar’s call clearly shows that though the Congress is maintaining cordial relations with TD supremo N. Chandrababu Naidu, it wants to keep the channel to Mr Reddy, his arch rival, open too.

Mr Naidu has been busy stitching together a coalition against the NDA especially trying to bring Uttar Pradesh parties, the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party on board to support the Congress.

“NCP chief Sharad Pawar was trying to talk to our chief, but he is unavailable to his calls. Looks like he is waiting for the results to talk to anyone from either side,” a top source in YSRC told Deccan Chronicle.

Incidentally, Mr Naidu met Mr Pawar at least twice during his trip to Delhi last week.

It is learnt that not to jeopardise the relationship with Mr Naidu, Congress deployed the NCP chief to hold talks with Mr Reddy.