AMARAVATI: Two BJP ministers in the Chandrababu Naidu Cabinet in Andhra Pradesh today resigned after the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) decided to pull out of the Narendra Modi government.
Health minister Kamineni Srinivas and Endowments minister P Manikyala Rao met the chief minister at the state Assembly and submitted their resignations.
They thanked him for having inducted them into the state Cabinet.
The chief minister, in turn, complimented the BJP members, saying they had discharged their duties well.
Later, speaking in the Andhra Pradesh Assembly, Srinivas said that his political career began in the TDP in 1982.
“My party membership registration number was 80. After serving the party for a few years, I stayed away from politics for close to three decades. I joined the BJP in 2014 on the invitation of Venkaiah Naidu (now Vice President) and became an MLA,” Srinivas, who is a doctor by profession, said.
He expressed satisfaction that he had discharged his duties as a minister without a single complaint.
“I felt very happy when the chief minister told me there was not a single complaint against me,” he said.
Earlier in the day, several ministers met the two BJP members in their chambers and had a friendly chat with them.
Last night, the TDP decided to exit the NDA government at the Centre, peeved over Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s stance on the state’s demand for grant of special category status.
TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu, however, did not announce snapping of ties with the BJP and said he would take a call on this later.
The BJP also decided to pull out of the coalition government in Andhra Pradesh after two TDP ministers in the Union Cabinet – Civil Aviation minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju and Minister of State for Science and Technology Y S Chowdary – decided to quit.-PTI
