Nobody knows better than Telugu Desam Party headed by former chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu to make use of his friendly media in attacking his political rivals in Andhra Pradesh.
He first gets a story planted in the pro-TDP media – Andhra Jyothy or Eenadu or TV5 – creating a panicky atmosphere against the Jagan Mohan Reddy government in Andhra Pradesh. Later, he uses the same story to attack the government.
On Monday, Andhra Jyothy carried a story comparing the financial situation in Andhra Pradesh with that of Sri Lanka.
For the last few months, the neighbouring island country has been on the brink of financial disaster with mounting debts, lack of money even for day-to-day administrative expenses, steep hike in fuel prices and power tariffs etc, due to bad administration by Prime Minister Gotabaya Rajapaksa.
Andhra Jyothy sought to create an impression among the people that the situation in Andhra Pradesh was no different.
It pointed out how the people are suffering from indiscriminate power cuts, rising prices of essential commodities etc. It accused the Jagan government of mismanaging the state financial position.
Without losing time, Naidu picked up Andhra Jyothy argument and expressed concern that Andhra Pradesh was slipping into a Sri Lanka-like economic catastrophe due to the policies of the Jagan government.
Naidu said the same opinion was expressed during a meeting of the top Central Government officials with the Prime Minister.
He said the heads of different departments had told the PM that AP was also fast falling into a very severe economic crisis because of its government policies. This was a matter of grave concern and it should be taken very seriously.
Naidu asserted that Jagan Mohan Reddy was imposing unbearable burdens on the people only for his personal wealth creation. The people should now realise how Jagan was perpetrating looting of sand and liquor.
“The chief minister's failure led to a steep rise in prices of essential commodities. The ruling YSRCP was over exploiting and plundering all types of natural resources in the state, while Jagan was imposing high taxes on the people and bringing massive loans in the name of mobilising revenue for the government,” he said.
