HYDERABAD: On a day when one more MLA from its side crossed over to the ruling TDP in Andhra Pradesh, the YSRC on Wednesday invoked former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to censure the TDP leadership’s act of engineering defections from the Opposition.
“Vajpayee, who is the living embodiment of values and ethics in politics, lost power just with one vote difference in 1996 after becoming prime minister. Had he tried to buy some MPs from the opposition, it wouldn’t have been difficult for him to stay in power. But the great leader relinquished power by holding on to ethics and values,” YSRC MP Mekapati Rajamohan Reddy said.
Addressing mediapersons in New Delhi, the YSRC Lok Sabha member said, “Even if the ruling party succeeds in wooing all the opposition members to its side, people of the State, who have been fed up with the anti-people policies of N Chandrababu Naidu, will not ready to back the TDP government.”
Back in Hyderabad, senior politico and YSRC leader Botcha Satyanarayana accused Chief Minister Naidu of engineering defections from the YSRC to the TDP.
“If Naidu still thinks that people are with him, he should ask all the defected MLAs to resign from their Assembly membership and seek fresh mandate. Naidu is adopting double standards on the issue of defections in Telangana and AP. In Telangana, the TDP is crying foul (over defection of its MLAs to TRS), whereas in AP, it is luring opposition MLAs,” he criticised.