YSRC, Jana Sena flay Chandrababu Naidu for special category status U-turn
Vijayawada: Three Opposition parties targeted AP Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu using a similar line of attack within the space of a few hours on Saturday. All three picked on Mr Naidu for thanking the Centre last year for the special package in lieu of special category status. YSRC chief Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy in the morning asked Mr Naidu at a media conference why he praised the BJP on January 27 last year over finance minister Arun Jaitley’s announcement of special package. Within an hour, Jana Sena chief Pawan Kalyan tweeted that the Telugu Desam chief was suffering from ‘Convenient Memory Loss Syndrome’.
At about the same time, BJP national general secretary Ram Madhav posted a tweet on his Twitter handle, attaching a clipping of a vernacular daily dated September 14, 2016, which showed Mr Naidu thanking Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the special package. These almost simultaneous reactions were nothing but the Common Minimum Programme of the three parties, said the TD leader Devineni Avinash.
The three parties criticised the CM for his U-turn on the special package. The YSRC and the Jana Sena were responding to Mr Naidu’s criticism that they were silent on the TD’s no-confidence motion. Reacting sharply to the CM’s statement, Mr Pawan Kalyan confined himself only to tweeting, alleging that the Telugu Desam was suffering from a short term memory loss like the protagonist in the Hindu film Ghajini.
Mr Pawan Kalyan said the Jana Sena would not do what was convenient but it would do what was right. He asked who had diluted the demand for SCS and who collided with the BJP? “TD should look back and talk. Do you give a guarantee that tomorrow you will not change your stand according to your convenience,” (sic) he asked Mr Naidu. Mr. Pawan Kalyan also attached a paper clipping of the TD MP Galla Jayadev’s statements on March 12, 2017, and July 20, 2018, on the matter.
Mr Jagan Mohan Reddy said that Mr Naidu may have pulled out of the NDA but had appointed Ms Sapna Munaganthi-war, wife of Maharashtra finance minister Sudhir Munaganthiwar, to the TTD board. He said that Mr Parakala Prabhakar, husband of defence minister Nirmala Sitaraman, was a close associate of Mr Naidu. “Rajnath Singh also said on Friday the relationship of Mr Naidu and the BJP was very strong like Fevi-Kwik,” Mr Jagan said.
