Within two days of the Telugu Desam Party-led National Democratic Alliance winning the assembly elections in Andhra Pradesh with a massive mandate of 164 out of 175 seats, revenge politics appear to have begun in the state.
Following unofficial instructions from the TDP leadership, cable operators on Thursday started blacking out television news channels like Sakshi TV, TV9, NTV and 10TV, which had adopted pro-YSR Congress party stand in the last five years and telecast anti-TDP news.
Cable TV Operators’ Association reportedly passed a unanimous resolution to this effect to black out these channels for an indefinite period.
Apparently, the TDP leadership has come to the conclusion that these channels have not mended their ways even after the election results and were still telecasting anti-TDP news and views.
“How can they continue to target the TDP and its president N Chandrababu Naidu even before he took over as the chief minister of the state? In the last five years, we were forced to block channels like TV5 and ABN,” a cable operator commented.
Apparently, the state government also reportedly instructed the officials to stop telecasting these channels on AP Fibernet grid, run by the government.
At the same time, instructions have also been given to all the government offices, gram panchayats and village secretariats to stop subscription of Sakshi newspaper, which was made compulsory during the last five years.
“This is expected to result in sharp decline in the circulation of Sakshi daily,” sources said.