india

Updated: Mar 02, 2019 15:52 IST

YSR Congress leader YS Jaganmohan Reddy on Saturday praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his strong political will for the air strike on a terror group Jaish-e-Mohammad’s camp across the Line of Control but said it won’t help the BJP during the elections in Andhra Pradesh.

“Modi ji did score a point. I would give credit to him for being bold and decisive,” Reddy said at the India Today Conclave-2019 in New Delhi.

In the same breath, he said the air strike will not have any bearing on Andhra Pradesh during the elections. “Prime Minister Modi’s failure to keep his promise of granting special category status to Andhra Pradesh will work against him in Anadhra Pradesh,” he asserted.

He accused both the Congress and the BJP of ditching Andhra Pradesh over the question of special category status and said that he doesn’t trust any of the national parties. He insisted that his party will support anyone meeting the special category status demand as a pre-condition.

He said the YSRC will fight the polls independently as it did in 2014. “We single-handedly fought the last election when the Telugu Desam Party’s Chandrababu Naidu put up a combined fight with Narendra Modi and actor Pawan Kalyan. Yet, he came to power with below 1 per cent margin”, Jagan Reddy recalled.

The YSRC leader exuded confidence over his party coming to power this time. “There is a perceptible dissatisfaction in all sections over the TDP’s rule and Chandrababu Naidu’s false promises. The election in 2019 will be between credibility represented by his party and Naidu’s opportunism,” Reddy asserted.

He ruled out returning to the Congress saying Rahul Gandhi party suffers from a crisis of confidence. “Congress party had brought out a book on Chief Minister Naidu’s corrupt deeds just three months before Telangana elections. Later, it joined hands with Naidu to cobble up a grand alliance against Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao. They can’t fool the people any longer,” he said.

On corruption cases foisted against him, the YSRC leader said they were all politically motivated. “There were no cases against me when my father was chief minister. All cases cropped up only when I decided to leave the Congress after his death”, he said.

Had his father Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy been corrupt, how could the Congress under his leadership return to power in 2009 with a huge mandate, presenting 33 out of 42 Lok Sabha seats to the Congress leadership enabling UPA-II to come to power at the Centre, he asked.

TDP law maker and spokesman Dokka Manikya Varaprasad said Reddy’s praise of Modi for the air strike “vindicated his unholy alliance with the BJP”.

The TDP has been building a narrative surrounding Narendra Modi, Jaganmohan Reddy and Telangana Chief Minsiter K. Chandrasekhar Rao holding them responsible for all the evils faced by Andhra Pradesh after it was split into two states.