YSRCP downplays Sharmila's move to join Congress

Amaravati, Jan 4 (PTI) YSRCP leaders on Thursday played down Y S Sharmila's move of joining the Congress and said any grand old party leader would be treated as their political opponent.

Sharmila, the younger sister of Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy, merged her YSR Telangana Party with the Congress in Delhi in the presence of Rahul Gandhi and party President Mallikarjun Kharge.

Andhra Pradesh Mines Minister P Ramachandra Reddy, reacted to the move, telling reporters that it doesn’t matter who joins the Congress or the TDP and asserted that Jagan Mohan Reddy would always be their leader.

“Our leader is Jagan Mohan Reddy and we will stand by him...,” he said.

Any leader, from TDP or Congress, working against the ruling YSRCP or Jagan Mohan Reddy will be viewed as an opponent, he added.

Gudivada MLA K Sri Venkateswara Rao said that the Congress as an opponent matters to them but not its leader, be it Sharmila or anybody else.

The Congress does not even have 1 per cent vote share in Andhra Pradesh, he pointed out.

Recalling the imprisonment of Jagan Mohan Reddy more than a decade ago in a graft case, Rao alleged that the Congress had backstabbed Y S Rajasekhara Reddy’s family.

Rajasekhara Reddy was a popular Congress leader and former Andhra Pradesh CM, who died in a chopper crash on September 2, 2009. He is the father of Jagan Mohan Reddy and Sharmila.

The Gudivada MLA also hit out at Sonia Gandhi, claiming she divided the southern state into two (Andhra Pradesh and Telangana) to "reap political dividends" without even understanding the state or its geography and destroyed ‘Andhra Pradesh’.

While addressing a public meeting at Kakinada on Wednesday, Jagan Mohan Reddy had cautioned that there would be many conspiracies in the days to come, which would also tear families apart.

Without taking names, the chief minister had said that new political alliances will be forged. PTI