Special category status: YSR Congress MPs will fast unto death, not just resign, says Jagan

GUNTUR: In a bid to corner the TDP politically and simultaneously turn up the heat on the Centre to accord special category status to Andhra Pradesh, YSRC president YS Jagan Mohan Reddy on Saturday announced that his party MPs will not only resign on the last day of the Budget session of  Parliament, but also go on an indefinite hunger strike at the Andhra Bhavan in New Delhi.

Jagan’s invitation to TDP MPs to follow suit and put in their papers has been met with scorn.

TDP MP K Rammohan Naidu dismissed Jagan’s plan as a publicity stunt and wondered how the resignations would help the state at this juncture. He observed that the YSRC’s proposed move would only deny them the opportunity to raise the state’s issues in Parliament. 

Addressing scores of people at Perecherla in Guntur district during his padayatra, Jagan also said his party cadre would take up relay hunger strikes in all the assembly constituencies in the state and called upon students to join the fast.

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He alleged that Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu who had failed to build even a single permanent structure in the capital city in the last four years was behaving like “a real estate broker who cheats people”. He questioned why Naidu had not been jailed yet for cheating people and urged people not to vote for someone who changed his stance every now and then.

“Naidu has shamelessly announced that his MPs will not quit, claiming that the leaders need to be at Parliament to raise AP’s cause. All this is a ploy to save his skin,” the Leader of Opposition said, adding that the Chief Minister’s “theatrics can win him an Oscar in the best actor category”.

He said the Chief Minister’s volte-face was on display on March 15 when he said the no-trust motion was not tenable and the very next day, spoke in support of the motion. “If all 25 MPs quit en masse, the pressure mounted on the Centre will be immense, but Chandrababu Naidu has been trying to save his skin by asking his MPs to stay put,” he said. 

Agriculture Minister and TDP Strategy Committee member Somireddy Chandramohan Reddy described YSRC MPs’ protests as donga deekshalu. “It is all a drama. They had four years to pressure the Central government, but did they? While we were allied with the BJP, they were the Opposition. Why did they not take up any hunger strike all these years? All they did was stand in the well of Parliament with placards and nothing more,” he said and dismissed the proposed hunger strike as a drama with an eye on the forthcoming elections. 

TDP leaders  mock YSRC resignations
Jagan’s invitation to TDP MPs to follow suit and put in their papers has been met with scorn. TDP MP K Rammohan Naidu dismissed Jagan’s plan as a publicity stunt, asking how the resignations would help AP at this juncture.