“Where was KA Paul all these days for four and half years. How could he become a CM, if not funny? And there is no way he could say that Jagan will not become Chief Minister of AP” said comedian Prithvi, breathing fire on evangelist KA Paul, as the latter made some harsh comments on YS Jagan. So what will KA Paul say to this?

“I am CM candidate, and I want to debate with Chief Minister candidates like Chandrababu Naidu and YS Jagan. Don’t ask me to respond on the comments thrown by buffoons like this comedians (read Prithvi) and bring my stature down. Jagan’s party has no credibility after he got struck in ED’s cases of disproportionate assets. They have even copied my flag design, which I got patented in 2008 itself” said KA Paul, once again targeting his guns on Jagan.

“Jagan might have done Paada Yaatra, but I’ve done Prapancha Yaatra”, says KA Paul, who is busy claiming that his Paul Army is busy finding all the issues of Andhra people and projecting himself as Chief Minister as he feels that his Praja Shanti Party will win with a greater majority.

Well, we can’t say what gave KA Paul that confidence, but when the likes of Pawan Kalyan are feeling tough, can this evangelist do any magic?

Telugu Desam Party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu would have been sitting in the opposition benches in the state assembly had his party not entered into an alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party in 2014 elections.

This was the observation made by BJP Andhra Pradesh unit president Kanna Lakshminarayana at a meeting of the party leaders held in Guntur on Saturday.

The meeting was held to discuss the arrangements to be made for the visit of Prime Miniter Narendra Modi to Andhra Pradesh on February 10 and 16.

Kanna said it was because of the charisma of Narendra Modi that the TDP could come to power in Andhra Pradesh.

In spite of massive assistance given by the Modi government to the state in the last four years, Naidu was launching the attack on the Prime Minister only for political gains and covering up his failure to run the state, he said.

The BJP president also commented that Naidu was acting like a contractor in the Polavaram project.

“What Naidu running is not a political party, but a drama company,” he alleged.

Meanwhile, the TDP president gave an explanation to his outburst against BJP floor leader in the assembly P Vishnukumar Raju on Friday.

He said he had to speak strongly against Raju only in his anguish to protect interests of the state.

Naidu claimed that he could have done miracles had the Centre supported him. He asked people to teach a fitting lesson to the BJP in the coming elections.

Telugu Desam Party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu is crying foul over the complete neglect of the state in the Union budget.

There was not a single reference to AP in the budget speech read out by Union minister Piyush Goel in Lok Sabha on Friday.

Interacting with party functionaries through teleconference on Saturday, Naidu alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party had betrayed Andhra Pradesh even in the last budget.

“The Central budget has given no relief to the poor, nor did the middle class get any benefit. The EBC income limit was Rs.8 lakh and the income-tax ceiling was raised to Rs 5 lakh. There are many such contradictions even in the IT rebate,” he said.

The States are advised to get NREGA loans although the Centre has yet to pay huge amounts as NREGA arrears. The budget also did not address the unemployment problem, he said.

Naidu claimed that his government had provided employment to 14 lakh in the State and in Kia alone, thousands got jobs.

“We brought automobile, IT and electronic industries to the State and the MSME Parks are generating jobs on a large scale,” he pointed out.

Naidu s observed that Friday was a historic day in State Assembly as almost all MLAs attended the Session in black shirts to protest against the injustice meted out to AP by the Centre. He said never before did the legislators attend Assembly wearing black shirts.

The TDP MPs also demonstrated in Delhi wearing black shirts; the state-wide Joint Action Committee (JAC) bandh was a success and all these were aimed to strongly protest the Centre’s attitude, he stated.

“We should not be complacent and tolerate the injustice done to the State. I thank all those who took part in the protests,” he said.

Telangana Rashtra Samithi president and chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao’s daughter and Nizamabad MP Kalvakuntla Kavitha on Saturday resigned from the posts of honourary presidents of several labour unions and organisations.

Kavitha had been serving as honourary president of the Telangana Boggu Gani Karmika Sangham (TBGKS), Telangana Electricity Workers’ Union, Anganwadi Teachers and Helpers’ Association and Association of Recognised Schools’ Managements all these days.

She sent her resignation letters to the general secretaries of the respective unions. She said she was unable to spare time for the union activities as she was occupied with other responsibilities.

Interestingly, her resignation comes close on the heels of her cousin and Siddipet MLA T Harish Rao’s resignation from the post of Telangana RTC Workers’ Union president a couple of days ago citing the same reasons.

Following the resignations, media has started finding out whether there was any link between the decisions of Kavitha and Harish Rao in resigning from trade union posts.

Naturally, they would not have resigned from their posts without any instructions from the chief minister.

There is a talk that the KCR government is planning to impose serious curbs on the activities of various trade unions in the coming days to prevent strikes and agitations in the wake of his plans to privatize Singareni Collieries and RTC.

Naturally, KCR would be in an embarrassing position, if his own kin head the union leader posts.