Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy on Friday said that slain former MP Y.S. Vivekananda Reddy was a paternal uncle for him and Kadapa MP Y.S. Avinash Reddy, and sought to know why anyone would kill his or her family member.
“In fact, TDP national president N. Chandrababu Naidu had created doubts in the minds of the people that someone very close to the slain MP or myself might have abetted the crime, to derive political mileage,” Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy alleged in the Legislative Assembly.
The Chief Minister was responding to the allegation made by Mr. Naidu that his family was being dragged into the political muddle and that his wife, who had been with him through the thick and thin of politics, was not spared.
Vivekananda Reddy’s murder had been committed when Mr. Naidu was the Chief Minister, and, therefore, the finger of blame points at the TDP leaders, Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy said.
The TDP had hatched several conspiracies to defeat Vivekananda Reddy in the MLC elections and succeeded in spite of the YSRCP’s domination, the Chief Minister alleged.
‘Naidu twisting facts’
“Mr. Naidu is twisting facts and desperately trying to drive a wedge among my family members by planting the seed of suspicion in my uncle’s murder. Whatever he does, God is watching,” Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy said.
Denying that the YSRCP MLAs made disparaging comments on Mr. Naidu’s family, the Chief Minister said they were only giving a retort to certain allegations made by the Leader of the Opposition.
He said the ruling party MLAs were insisting that if Mr. Naidu wanted a discussion on the charges he had been levelling against the Chief Minister, he should be prepared for a debate on the murder of Vangaveeti Mohan Ranga and A. Madhava Reddy, and the suicide of Mallela Babji too.
But, in a knee-jerk reaction, Mr. Naidu said his family was being targeted to earn sympathy.
The Chief Minister said that Mr. Naidu and his party MLAs should have made constructive suggestions in the Assembly when a serious debate was taking place on the issues related to the agriculture sector, but what happened was unfortunate.
Mr. Naidu was in a frustration because of his party’s successive electoral defeats in the last two-and-a-half years and its strength coming down in the Legislative Council.
The Chief Minister further said that Mr. Naidu was habituated to making out-of-context and provocative statements in the House, to which anyone would respond in the same coin.
