Gist : Jagan’s TV9 interview

With elections approaching fast, political equations are changing fast and political climate in the state is charged. Jagan gave an interview to TV9 today. Usually Jagan rarely gives such elaborate interviews to the channels other than his own Sakshi TV. So people were curious to see how he will handle this interview. Moreover, in recent times people are lambasting TV9 for being too much biased for ruling TDP party and so Jagan’s interview in this channel curiously watched by many. Here’s the gist of the interview

As always, Jagan started the interview with fuming at Chandra Babu Naidu. He sarcastically told, CBN is releasing one new movie every day. One day he releases a movie explaining how great the upcoming capital would be, and the other day, he releases another movie in which he says he is not aware of pensions not being released to the people and he says he will release all of them immediately, Jagan added, but again, it will be just a movie and no concrete action would be taken by TDP government on any of the issues.

While concluding the interview, he made even serious comments on CBN and told CBN did 6 lakh crores worth of corruption in the last 4 years. He explained how his own Heritege company bought 14 acres of land at capital city before announcing location of capital and told, this is nothing but insider trading. He added, if he comes into power, his government will definitely look into all CBN’s corruption and courts will decide whether CBN will have to go to Jail or not.

When asked about being soft on BJP and supporting BJP on various issues, Jagan reminded that during demonetization it was only he and his party opposed BJP’s move while CBN supported demonetization and in fact CBN was the chairman of the committee for implementing demonetization. He also reminded that during GST also, none criticized except YSRCP. He also reminded that  TDP leader Yanamala was the member of the committee on GST implementation.

When asked about YSRCP MP Vijay Sai Reddy meeting PM Modi, he told in the span of 4 years, as MP he met PM only couple of times and any MP would get a chance to meet PM. But, he added, media projected this meetings in a wrong way. He concluded, YSRCP doesn’t have anything to do with BJP.

When asked about how he would achieve SCS without support of a national party, he told if people give 25 MP seats for YSRCP, he will support any party that grants Special category status to the state  without bothering which party is that and who will be the PM.

When asked about not contesting in Telangana elections, he answered frankly that his party is not strong in Telangana. He admitted that he never focused on Telangana politics and he never addressed any issues related to Telangana people in the last 4 years. Now how can I go and ask Telangana people to vote for my party, he questioned. He also told that if his party contested in Telangana, Uttam Kumar Reddy also might have lost the elections as his Party candidate is strong in that constituency. He added that his party will definitely contest in next assembly election in Telangana , as by that time , anti-incumbency on KCR might be ripened.

When asked about his relations with TRS and KCR, he told he never met KCR and only once he called KCR, that too to congratulate him after 2018 election result. But he appreciated KCR for supporting special category status to Andhra Pradesh. He also appreciated TRS MP Kavitha for supporting special category status to Andhra Pradesh in the parliament.

When asked about his dictatorial style of working, he answered frankly and told that , in regional parties, people vote based on the leader of the party. He added, only critics of our party do these kind of allegations and no fan of our party ever did these kind of comments.

He also appealed people to vote considering his leadership rather than the local MLA candidates.

When asked about the influence of Pawan Kalyan in 2019 elections and probable triangular fight in the election, Jagan reminded that Chandrababu Naidu told during Telangana elections that Telangana Janasena supported TDP ( but actually it was a blooper from Chandrababu Naidu who got confused kodandaram Telangana Jana samithi with Telangana janasena). He added,   recently also CBN invited Pawan to join hands with him. Jagan told, he never spoke to Pawan personally. Jagan put forward a theory that,  if Pawan goes without any alliance with TDP, it will only dent TDP’s vote bank as all fans of Pawan Kalyan supported TDP in 2014 and so,  there is no impact on YSRCP. On the other hand,  if they go with alliance, YSRCP will be the sole claimant for all anti-incumbency votes and it will actually help YSRCP, Jagan added. So whether Janasena contests alone or allies with TDP, YSRCP will be winner in either case, explained Jagan.

When asked about the attack on him in Vizag airport, Jagan responded that, VIP lounges in airports are supposed to be most secured places, but the attack happened on him in such a secured place. He told, Harshavardhan chowdary, owner of the restaurant in which assailant Srinivasa rao  worked, is strong sympathizer and he was even TDP ticket aspirant in 2014.  So definitely there must be a conspiracy, Jagan added.

Overall:

Overall Jagan interview was candid and to the point but there was nothing new in this interview. Those who follow Jagan interviews in Sakshi or his speeches during padayatra can see most of the points been repeated in this interview. But nonetheless, this interview helps Jagan reach out to neutral people, who don’t watch Jagan’s Sakshi regularly.

– Zuran ( @CriticZuran)