After three days of his Delhi visit, BJP AP President Somu Veerraju has made a stunning and surprising announcement today. He said that the Central Government has not made any sort of statement on the Visakha Steel Plant. Veerraju further said that it was only Chandrababu Naidu and the communists who were raising a hue and cry. The whole steel plant agitation was their creation only to embarrass and counter the BJP rise in Andhra Pradesh.

By what Veerraju has said, the overall agitation against the privatisation of the VSP has become irrelevant. Chief Minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy’s meetings with the agitating workers at the Vizag airport have also become irrelevant. Obviously, Veerraju has also preferred to ignore the MoU that was signed with the South Korean Posco company as well.

Interestingly, there are no reports from the BJP side so far about Veerrajju and his party AP leaders efforts to meet Amit Shah. There was also no clarity on the response of the other Union Ministers to the BJP AP team’s representations for the merger of the Vizag Steel Plant with SAIL or some other PSU.

At the same time, Veerraju’s latest comments have given rise to doubts whether the Modi-Shah regime was silently washing its hands of the steel plant controversy.