nara lokesh: TDP to keep equal distance from both NDA, INDIA blocs: Nara Lokesh

Even as INDIA bloc parties have come out in support of former Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu following his arrest in a Skill Development scam, Telugu Desam Party national general secretary Nara Lokesh has said the party remains non-aligned and equidistant both from BJP and the opposition alliance

“We are non-aligned. We stand for the rights of the Telugu people,” Lokesh told ET in an interview. In Delhi to garner support for his father Chandrababu Naidu, who has been remanded to judicial custody for 14 days by a Vijayawada court, Lokesh said he had not contacted any BJP leader.

“The party MPs have sought time from president, prime minister, home minister and home secretary to take up the wrongful arrest of my father. But we have not heard from them,” said Lokesh. Naidu was arrested by the Andhra Pradesh Crime Investigation Department (CID) in the early hours of September 9 in an alleged Skill Development Corporation scam. INDIA bloc leaders, including West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, National Conference’s Farooq Abdullah, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, and former BJP ally Shiromani Akali Dal chief Sukhbir Singh Badal came out in support of Naidu, calling his arrest “vendetta politics”.

TDP, however, is walking the political tightrope. Though Naidu had emerged as a pivot of opposition unity in the run-up to 2019 parliamentary elections, he has remained cold towards opposition’s attempt to cobble up a united front against the BJP.