VIJAYAWADA: Making it clear that the YSR Congress is not aspiring to play any role in national politics and it does not want to rule the nation, YSR Congress State general secretary Sajjala Ramakrishna Reddy said their support to the BJP at the Centre is issue-based.
"Our agenda and policy is much clear than any other party. We will support the BJP when there is no harm to our interests at the State level," Sajjala asserted. He was responding to a query on Eluru MP Kotagiri Sridhar’s recent remarks that the YSRC is supporting the BJP at the Centre in many aspects and that was clearly evident.
"Even when we were in Opposition, we supported the Centre on some issues, expressed conditional reservations on some. For us, the welfare and interests of the State are important. In an issue which does not hurt us, we support them," he explained.
On the Presidential candidates of both the NDA and Opposition not campaigning in the State and seeking support of either YSR Congress or TDP, Sajjala said that the YSR Congress is of the view that there should be consensus when electing Constitutional posts.
"We did the same while electing Kodela Siva Prasada Rao as the Speaker of the previous Legislative Assembly," he reminded, adding that they have decided to support the NDA candidate who hails from the tribal community.
Sajjala, however, wondered as to why the Opposition TDP did not come out openly on the issue. "We think that the TDP is not coming out as it might be unhappy that Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu was not the NDA candidate," he said.