Telugu Desam Party (TDP) national president N. Chandrababu Naidu said on January 3 that he was neither longing to become the Chief Minister again nor was the TDP-Jana Sena Party (JSP) alliance desperate to come to power, asserting that their goal was to get rid of Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy and his YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) in the interest of the people and the State’s future.
Addressing a meeting after welcoming leaders from various parties, who included YSRCP MLC C. Ramachandraiah, former Minister Dadi Veerabhadra Rao and former MLA Gadikota Dwarakanath Reddy (relative of YSRCP Rajya Sabha member V. Vijaya Sai Reddy) into the party, Mr. Naidu said the State was bogged down by a massive debt of nearly ₹12 lakh crore, but there was little development as Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy was obsessed with welfare.
He pointed out that Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy had scrapped a majority of the welfare schemes that were implemented by the TDP government and changed the names of the remaining.
He alleged that Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy cheated the people of Visakhapatnam by promising to shift the capital, which proved to be impossible as the Supreme Court adjourned the SLP filed by the State against the High Court order to April.
Mr. Naidu said the Polavaram project had come to a halt due to the YSRCP government’s ineptitude, and the potential for industrial development remained largely untapped due to the hostile business environment.
He observed that Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy resorted to “transfer of MLAs” (almost all of them from the BC, SC, ST and minority communities) in the run-up to elections, unmindful of the fact that it was of no use. “The Chief Minister himself is being seen as a liability,” Mr. Naidu stated, while warning people of the consequences of re-electing the YSRCP.
