BJP State president Kanna Lakshminarayana said on Saturday that Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu’s alliance with the Congress would have jolted Deputy Chief Minister K.E. Krishnamurthy, Minister Ch. Ayyanna Patrudu and others, who had openly commented that it was tantamount to committing “political suicide.”
Mr. Naidu had no qualms in turning foes into friends and vice-versa at the mere drop of a hat, but what would the TDP leaders and cadres, who were against the step taken by their leader, say now? They should come out if they had self-respect, he asserted.
Addressing the media here, Mr. Lakshminarayana said Mr. Naidu had vowed to bury the Congress for its follies, but changed his stand overnight. He questioned whether the TDP cadres would still be subservient to their president, who proved that his habit of switching loyalties would die hard.
Entry into TDP
He pointed out that Mr. Naidu had castigated the TDP when he was initially in the Congress. Only after the Congress bit the dust in the elections, Mr. Naidu carved his way into the TDP by pleading with his father-in-law and party founder-president N.T. Rama Rao.
Mr. Naidu now aligned with the Congress, which had caused the bifurcation of the State because he felt insecure and feared a debacle in the 2019 elections, the BJP leader said.
Alliance with Left parties
He recalled that Mr. Naidu had forged an alliance with the Left parties for the general elections in 1996, 1998 and 1999 and veered around to the BJP in 2004.
He went on to dump the alliance with the BJP, which he described as a “historic blunder,” in 2009 and sailed with the TRS and the Left parties.
Modi wave
Mr. Naidu was back to the BJP in 2014 when the Modi wave was at its peak, and he had even moved a resolution in the NDA in 2017 in favour of Mr. Modi becoming the Prime Minister again.
Eventually, Mr. Naidu turned the tables against Mr. Modi and landed in the Congress camp due to fear of being pulled up for the “large-scale corruption” in the State. Mr. Naidu spurned the Central government’s offer of ₹16,500 crore towards the special financial assistance in lieu of the Special Category Status to portray the BJP as a villain, but his conspiracy would ultimately boomerang, he said.