Telugu Desam Party headed by former Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu, which had steered the wheel in running the governments at the centre in the past and was till two years ago a part of the NDA government at the Centre, has suddenly found itself out of place.
Such is the pathetic situation of the TDP is that it was not even considered for being part of the discussions being conducted by the Centre to work out strategies to fight the Coronavirus in the country.
On Wednesday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi interacted with all the opposition parties in the country through video conference to discuss the Covid-19 situation in the country. All the parliamentary party leaders of various political parties were invited to the video conference.
But the TDP was not part of the conference. Though Guntur MP Galla Jayadev is its parliamentary party leader, he was not invited for the conference.
Reason: PM wanted to talk the leaders of only those parties which have at least five MPs, including both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha members.
The TDP has only four MPs – three Lok Sabha members: Galla Jayadev, K Rammohan Naidu and Kesineni Nani, besides one RS member – Kanakamedala Ravindra Kumar. Though Thota Sita Rama Lakshmi was there till recently, her term expired on April 2 itself.
Three of its Rajya Sabha members Sujana Chowdary, C M Ramesh and T G Venkatesh had defected to the BJP. Had they continued in the TDP, the party would have been part of the historic fight against Covid-19.
On behalf of YSR Congress party, its parliamentary party leader V Vijay Sai Reddy took part in the conference.
The YSRC has 22 Lok Sabha members and two RS members. Four other RS members – Pilli Subhash Chandra Bose, Mopidevi Venkataramana, Parimal Nathwani and A Ayodhya Rami Reddy are all set to win, the elections to the Rajya Sabha are postponed due to Covid-19.
