For the last few days, the Telugu Desam Party-led coalition government in Andhra Pradesh has been systematically targeting the YSR Congress party leaders by digging up old cases and sending them to jails.
Whenever a YSRCP leader is arrested or cases are filed against others, party president and former chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy issues a statement condemning the same and directing the legal team of the party to extent all possible legal assistance to the affected leaders.
However, the YSRCP legal team has miserably failed to secure bail to the arrested, let alone putting up a strong argument in the courts to get the cases quashed. Many party leaders and social media activists are facing cases due to inaction of the legal team.
Senior leaders like Nandigam Suresh, Pinnelli Ramakrishna Reddy and Jogi Ramesh managed to get the bail due to their own efforts, rather than the fight by the YSRCP legal team.
Former additional advocate general and present YSRCP general secretary Ponnavolu Sudhakar Reddy or the party legal cell president Manoha Reddy have proved to be a big liability to the party, as they fail to put up a tough fight in the courts.
According to sources in the part, while popular lawyers like S Niranjan Reddy are being roped in case of big leaders, the so-called lawyers in the legal team are being asked to defend the lower-rung leaders and activists.
In case of former Gannavaram MLA Vallabhaneni Vamsi, who was arrested in connection with a kidnap case and attack on TDP office case, Ponnavolu argued in the court, but he failed to secure bail to him.
So is the case with popular Tollywood comedian and writer Posani Krishna Murali, who was arrested for allegedly making abusive and provocative remarks against the TDP top leaders and Jana Sena chief Pawan Kalyan.
Jagan asked the YSRCP legal team to argue Posani case, but Ponnavolu and others has miserably failed to put up a strong defence and get him the bail. Apparently, Posani was terribly upset with Ponnavolu for not arguing the case strongly.
“There is a talk in the party that only big leaders get the assistance of top lawyers from Supreme Court, while the lower-rung leaders do not get any proper legal assistance,” a source said.
Even when Jagan was in power, the party’s legal team could not come to the rescue of his social media activists, who were arrested by the CBI in connection with the alleged posting of negative comments against judiciary, sources recalled.
