YSRCP ministers launch combined attack on suspended MLA, a day after her outburst

On Monday, Home Minister Taneti Vanita, Municipal Minister Adimulapu Suresh, Deputy Chief Minister Narayana Swamy, Industries Minister Gudivada Amarnath and Tourism Minister RK Roja fired salvos at Sridevi.

Dismissing Sridevi’s statements as “laughable”, Vanita said they looked like a script written by TDP supremo Nara Chandrababu Naidu.

She reminded the MLA that the ruling party had given her a lot of respect and recognition. The minister also questioned Sridevi for addressing a news conference in Telangana.

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Countering the narrative

Refuting the MLA’s allegations that the Jagan Mohan Reddy government had been insulting Dalits, Suresh claimed that the YSRCP regime had embraced the Dalits.

Roja said the four suspended YSRCP MLAs — Sridevi, Anam Ramnarayan Reddy, Mekapati Chandrasekhar Reddy, and Kotamreddy Sridhar Reddy — would lose their political future.

Narayana Swamy pointed out that people who won Reddy’s support backstabbed him. History would mark them as rogues, the minister added.

Amaranth said he had always doubted Sridevi’s political leanings.

He added that the MLA, along with her daughter, posed for a picture with the chief minister before voting, but was now playing the Dalit card after being exposed.

Sridevi on Sunday denied receiving any kickbacks for cross-voting. She asked if anybody would offer crores of rupees for voting in an MLC election.

Advisor to the government and YSRCP general secretary Sajjala Ramakrishna recently said that an internal investigation uncovered the cross-voting, leading to the suspension of the four MLAs.

He alleged that Naidu had offered ₹15-20 crore to each MLA for cross-voting in the MLC polls.