Andhra Pradesh

Exclusive : `Only YSRCP will decide who it will support in Delhi’

While insisting that the YSR Congress and the Telangana Rashtra Samiti are friendly with each other, the YSRCP has dismissed any talk of outsourcing its decision on who to support at the Centre to Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao. 

“KCR taking a call on Jagan’s behalf is bunkum. We as a party cannot outsource such an important decision which is strategic in nature, to a third person, however close he is. It is a decision only we will take,” said a close associate of YSRCP chief YS Jaganmohan Reddy. 

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What is significant about this statement is that on 9 May, the party position was that it was grateful to KCR for having stood by them on the issue of Special Category status (SCS). Subsequently after KCR’s visit to Pinarayi Vijayan and MK Stalin, the impression had gained ground that YSRCP and the TRS will act like a single bloc and take a joint decision on its plans for the Centre.

This is not the first time the party is taking a conscious decision to keep a strategic distance from KCR. A section of the party’s war room was miffed with Jagan meeting KT Rama Rao in full media glare in Hyderabad in January when the former dropped in to ask for support for the Federal Front (pic above).

The party was apprehensive about how it will play out in the Andhra elections as Jagan could be accused of compromising on Andhra interests and selling out to Telangana. Which is why Jagan was dissuaded from following up on the meeting with KTR with one with the TRS chief. Chandrababu Naidu did play the KCR-Jagan jugalbandi card but it did not gain much traction with the electorate. 

The YSRCP also makes it clear that should the numbers throw up a hung Lok Sabha and its support is critical to the formation of the new government, it will take a call depending on the dynamics of the situation. 

“Nothing is ruled out,” the YSRCP leader said in response to Filter Kaapi‘s question if support to the BJP or the Congress (where Jagan was a MP earlier) is out of the question. “So long as it is in Andhra’s interest, we will do it.”

On the campaign trail, Jagan had maintained that he will support any party at the Centre that grants SCS to Andhra Pradesh. 

The one aspect that is completely ruled out is being part of any bloc that also includes Chandrababu Naidu.

“That is an absolute No,” is the final word. 

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