Saturday, May 11, 2013

TELUGU DESAM RATTLES OVER KADIYAM QUIT

By Renuka Rao / Hyderabad

Telugu Desam Party 
Politburo member and senior leader Kadiyam Srihari jolted Chandrababu Naidu by quitting the Telugu Desam Party with which he has been associated for more than two and a half decades. He just did not stop at severing his connections with the TDP, he decided to cross over to Telangana Rashtra Samithi.
With TRS leaders already calling on the senior leader, it is becoming clear that he might contest as MP candidate from Warangal Lok Sabha constituency.

He threw a lot of stones and mud at the party. The most important of the charges he leveled against the party had vindicated the allegation being constantly made by the YSR Congress that the TDP had a secret pact with the ruling Congress.

Srihari claimed that he had opposed the party’s decision not to support the no-confidence motion. He said he wanted the TDP to move the motion in the first place. By remaining silent, the party had just vindicated the charge.

He sought to know why there was no action against the Members of Parliament who “abstained” from voting against the Foreign Direct Investments in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha.

“Up to 2004, I was TDP district convener. In 1994 and 1999 general elections and 2008 by-elections, I was elected from Station Ghanpur Assembly seat as TDP. I was given an opportunity to serve as a minister for nine-and-half years heading departments like marketing, social welfare, school education, major and medium irrigation.

“I constantly strove hard to fetch good name for the party without giving any scope for any charge of corruption. TDP gave me opportunities and gave me recognition. There is no doubt. I am grateful to NTR and Chandrababu Naidu for encouraging me.

“After 1999 election, there was a marked change in our leadership. Naidu ran the govt like a Limited company and he behaved like a CEO rather than a popularly elected Chief Minister. He began paying heed to industrialists  and did a lot of unpopular experiments and thus distancing the party from the people. The leadership did not recognise this widening gap.

“Are the people happy with the reforms being implemented by the party? Are people endorsing our administration?” he asked.

“The party never introspected to rectify its defects. NTR used to give priority to commoners and educated people. After 1999, only industrialists and the rich were given priority in the party. We highlighted the brewing discontent among the people with the leadership. We were routed in 2004 and 09 and lost all byelections after 2009.

“As a party that ruled for 16.5 years in the State, and a party that wielded influence in the national politics, theer cannot be a bigger humuliation that being reduced to nothing and we never could introspect the situation,” Srihari observed.

Srihari, who represented the TDP at the all-party meeting convened by the Centre on Telangana issue, pushed the party into an embarrassment by alleging that it had never asserted that ut was in favour of the creation of a separate Telangana. He indicated that there was no clarity in t he letter issued by the TDP on the pertinent issue. The TDP could never impress the electorate in Telangana that it was ready to espouse the cause of a separate State.

People are not trusting the TDP and Naidu on the Telangana issue.

Media that owes allegiance to Chandrababu Naidu got some TDP loudmouths to castigate Srihari. In fact, Mothkupalli Narasimhulu took little extra liberty in snubbing Kadiyam, using the elbow space available to him constitutionally and communally. A posse of TDP leaders became readily available to all TV channels to launch a diatribe against Srihari. But how many of them would stick to the TDP in future is a conjecture of time.

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