BJP State president Kanna Lakshminarayana said A.P. could avail the Central government’s offer of a special package amounting to ₹16,500 crore any moment by forming a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) and that party’s national president Amit Shah promised to get it sanctioned by talking to the Ministers concerned.
Naidu’s ‘game plan’
Addressing media persons in New Delhi after meeting Mr. Shah on Wednesday, Mr. Lakshminarayana said A.P. officials told the Centre earlier that they could not draw more than ₹1,000 crore a year towards 90% of the money that would come if the Special Category Status (SCS) was granted, expressing their inability to contribute the balance 10% due to budgetary constraints.
Because the State failed on that count and the SCS ceased to exist, the Centre offered the special package of ₹3,500 crore per year but A.P. spurned it also as part of Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu’s political strategy for the 2019 elections, he alleged. Mr. Lakshminarayana said Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Mr. Shah genuinely felt bad for what happened to A.P. and were still willing to support it, but Mr. Naidu firmed up his own single-point agenda, which was to portray the BJP as villain. A.P. requested the Centre to arrange funds for externally-aided projects through domestic financial institutions after the foreign agencies insisted that they be given a mobilisation advance of 30% during the loan process. Mr. Lakshminarayana said he told Mr. Modi that it was a mistake to have believed Mr. Naidu who ditched the party on earlier occasions. The State unit was telling the masses that the TDP was one of the parties that cheated people in 2014 in the name of the Samaikyandhra movement and they should be wary of its evil designs this time around. Party leaders G.V.L. Narasimha Rao, D. Purandeswari and P. Vishnu Kumar Raju were present. Mr. Lakshminarayana and other leaders met Mr. Modi on Tuesday and apprised him of the State scenario.
