Ongole (AP): Telugu Desam Party chief N Chandrababu Naidu on Friday tore into the YSR Congress regime in Andhra Pradesh over a host of issues and said an “inept” person like Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy was ineligible to continue as Chief Minister. “Is any one section of the society happy with Jagan’s rule? Except unleashing vendetta, what has Jagan done for the people of Andhra Pradesh in the last three years,” the former Chief Minister questioned.
In his inaugural address at the TDP’s annual conclave Mahanadu here, Naidu gave the call “Quit Jagan Save Andhra Pradesh”, exhorting people to vote out the “scandalous and ruinous” regime in the state. “Jagan is a psychopath. All his thoughts and actions are destructive. The state has suffered heavy damage in the three years of his rule so far,” the TDP chief said.
He warned that it would be the end of good days for the state if Reddy continued as Chief Minister. “That is why I have given the call ‘Quit Jagan Save Andhra Pradesh’. All sections should work in unison…and save the state from further destruction,” Naidu added. The former chief minister recalled that his previous government spent 52 per cent of the budget on welfare programmes, which the present regime cut down to 41 per cent.
“Yet, these people shamelessly claim theirs is a welfare government! Where is all the state’s revenue going? Where are the central grants going? What about the lakhs of crores of rupees borrowed by this government,” Naidu questioned. He demanded that the government publish the facts on the state’s finances.
While welfare programmes have been watered down, the state administration has completely given up on any development, the former CM said. The multipurpose Polavaram project, the lifeline of AP, and the capital city Amaravati stood testimony to this, Naidu pointed out.
“There are no roads, no other infrastructure development in the last three years but the government has been fleecing people in the name of one tax or the other. It is collecting tax even on garbage,” he said. This is the first Mahanadu that the TDP has organised as a public function after a gap of three years. While in 2019, the Mahanadu was not conducted because of the party’s electoral rout, it only did brief online sessions in 2020 and 2021 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Mahanadu, the biggest “festival” for the party rank and file, brought a new-found enthusiasm this time. “Telugu Desam (Party) is 40 years-old now. It has seen many ups and downs in those four decades but the kind of odds and troubles it encountered in the last three years, under the oppressive Jagan regime, are unprecedented. It leaves me very anguished,” Naidu said in an emotional voice.
He, however, asserted that TDP workers were not ones to be cowed down by any adversity or threats. “Not only our party workers but also everybody in the state is feeling stifled and frustrated. That should spell doom for Jagan,” Naidu warned.
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