At a time when every Telugu Desam Party MP and minister is bringing pressure on party president and chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu to break the alliance with Bharatiya Janata Party, finance minister Yanamala Ramakrishnudu seems to be opposed to the idea.
Yanamala reportedly told Naidu during the meeting of ministers held on Thursday that it would not be right to take any hasty decision on alliance and suggested that the party should give some more time to do justice to the state.
“Let us wait till the budget session is over and continue to bring pressure on the Centre for making more allocations. There is still scope for making changes in the budgetary allocations and we should pursue the policy of lobbying,” he is learnt to have told Naidu.
However, Naidu expressed apprehension that it might send a wrong signal among the people that the TDP was not acting tough despite facing humiliation.
In fact, Yanamala did not make any strong criticism against the Union budget. He welcomed the budget saying it “addressed the real things” with more focus on rural economy and agriculture sector. He, however, was “not happy” that Jaitley did not touch upon issues related to Andhra Pradesh, in the budget speech.
“Unless we read the various budget volumes, we will not know how much we will get under different schemes,” Ramakrishnudu said. He said overall, there were many welcome features in it.
Asked if the budget was an indicator of early elections, he remarked, “May be. We don’t know what’s in their minds,” he said.
