TDP-BJP on brink of separation? Chandrababu Naidu holds key party meet to discuss alliance

Chandrababu Naidu is upset with the allocation of funds for Andhra Pradesh in the Union Budget 2018 despite its request for additional funds.

AMARAVATI: A key decision on the ties between Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and ally Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is likely to be taken in the meeting between Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu and TDP members that is currently underway in Amaravati 

Naidu is upset with the allocation of funds for the state in the Union Budget 2018 despite its request for additional funds.

Ahead of the TDP Parliamentary Board meeting, party leader K Rammohan Rao said: "We are discussing the Budget. A political alliance is different and development of the state is different."

Another party MP P. Ravindra Babu confirmed that the CM is not happy with the funds allocated to the state. "Whatever the CM decides, we will stand by it. We are not happy with the BJP budget, not happy with the budget allotted to AP," the TDP MP said.

The TDP is BJP's biggest ally in the South. The two parties had fought the 2014 elections in alliance where the TDP had emerged as the second largest party in the NDA in terms of seats won. 

After Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announced the Budget on February 1, several TDP leaders had suggested that the party should break away from the alliance.

Naidu had reportedly expressed "serious displeasure" over the budget and had said that the Centre ignored the state. "Bengaluru, Mumbai and Ahmedabad got a substantial allocation for various projects but none of our projects, including the Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam Metro rail, got anything," he was quoted to have said at the meeting.

"At the time of the state bifurcation, I was the only one who demanded equal treatment to both the states. Though gross injustice was done to Andhra on account of bifurcation, I aligned with the BJP only because having good relations with the Centre could undo the injustice," Naidu apparently told the TDP leaders.