Vijayawada: TD is countering YSRC’s attack on defections by bringing up and criticising YSRC chief Jagan Mohan Reddy’s ED cases. The party has also directed its leaders to highlight that late Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy had been the one to initiate the practice of defection. TD believes that the public will not take the defections seriously, and that it will focus on Jagan’s ED cases instead.
Despite the YSRC chief’s national level protest, TD seems to be at ease. The party feels that Jagan’s protests will have no impact on its image in the current political scenario. TD plans to ignore the protest against defections, as it feels that any reaction will intensify the issue. However, it has decided to take stand on YSRC’s role in the matter.
YSRC is trying to establish Mr Naidu’s double standards on defections by pointing out how TD had reacted to Talasani Srinivas Yadav’s defection to the TRS; and TD is trying to knock YSRC down by talking about Jagan Mohan Reddy’s cases, from the oldest to the most recent. The Chief Minister himself is involved in this battle; he has criticised the opposition party by asking what right an economic offender has to criticise the ruling party on allegations of constitutional violation. Mr Naidu has demanded that Jagan respond to the ED’s tweet regarding his investments in shell companies in Kolkata, instead of protesting against defections.
TD is also trying to justify that one shouldn’t consider the migration of YSRC MLAs to TD as defections, as they were motivated by their detachment from Jagan, because Jagan was not committed to working for development. TD has passed on this message to its leaders, and asked them to use it as their argument whenever they are questioned by YSRC regarding the defections.
