Bisheshwar Mishra / NEW DELHI
Four of the six Telugu Desam Party members of Rajya Sabha today joined the BJP. YS Chowdary, C M Ramesh, T G Venkatesh joined the party in presence of BJP Working President J P Nadda and Union Minister Thawarchand Gehlot at the party Headquarters in New Delhi while MP G Mohan Rao could not come due to health reasons.
Mr Nadda said, he along with the MPs met Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu. Mr Nadda said, their decision to join the BJP will help strengthen the party base in Andhra Pradesh.
The four MPs have informed the Vice President that they no longer had any links with their party. With the resignation of four MPs, the Telugu Desam Party strength in the Rajya Sabha had come down to two.
C M Ramesh and Y S Chowdary, two of the four TDP Rajya Sabha members who crossed over to the BJP Thursday, are also industrialists and have been under the scanner of Income Tax, CBI and Enforcement Directorate.
Ramesh’s name came up during the tussle in the CBI between then Director Alok Verma and Special Director Rakesh Asthana, and there has been an Income Tax investigation regarding a company said to be linked to him. Chowdary, on the other hand, has been on the radar of the CBI and ED in an alleged bank loan fraud case.
In the past, both have claimed innocence, and denied any wrongdoing. Text messages sent to them Thursday did not elicit any response.
Incidentally, in November last year, it was BJP MP and spokesperson G V L Narasimha Rao who called Chowdary and Ramesh “Andhra Mallyas” and wrote to the Rajya Sabha Ethics Committee, seeking initiation of “suitable action” against them.
Posting a November 28 letter he had written to the chairman of the Ethics Committee, Rao tweeted: “I’ve complained to Ethics Committee to seek disqualification of two TDP MPs, Y.S. Choudary & C.M.Ramesh who have earned the dubious title of “Andhra Mallyas” with massive financial scandals…”.
In October last year, an Income Tax probe found suspicious transactions to the tune of about Rs 100 crore in a company associated with Ramesh. According to the I-T, the company, Rithwik Projects Pvt Ltd (RPPL), had allegedly siphoned Rs 74 crore through untraceable transactions, while bills of Rs 25 crore were found to be “dubious”.
TDP MPs of Rajya Sabha join BJP in presence of BJP Working President Shri @JPNadda and Shri @TCGEHLOT. pic.twitter.com/DF56jjDeqn
— BJP (@BJP4India) June 20, 2019