Hyderabad: Y.S.Sharmila Reddy, president of the Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee, has publicly accused her brother and former Chief Minister Y.S.Jagan Mohan Reddy of usurping family property.
In Vijayawada on Monday, Sharmila said for the first time that Jagan failed to transfer her rightful share in Saraswati Power Private Limited. Although she denied any interest in fighting for property, she asserted that a 2019 Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) regarding family assets was intended to deny her a fair portion of the wealth of their late father Y.S.Rajasekhara Reddy, or YSR.
This escalation follows a notarised statement from their mother, YS Vijayalakshmi, or better known as Y.S.Vijayamma, issued on 21 March.
“The YSR Congress Party members are calling my mother’s letter untrue,” she said.
Calling her brother’s party ‘Shaitaan’s Sainyam’, or the Devil’s Army, she questioned the YSRCP members’ need to respond to a personal issue. “Jagan knows that the letter’s contents are true. If it is a lie, why are they responding to its contents?”
Vijayalakshmi has called for an equitable re-distribution of her late husband’s wealth among her children and grandchildren, stepping into the already acrimonious legal dispute between Jagan and daughter Sharmila.
She issued a notarised document on Friday stating her late husband’s wealth was never fairly apportioned to daughter and her four grandchildren.
Accusing her son Jagan of arrogating the family’s wealth, she said that all assets held up until the time of YSR’s passing in 2009 constitute family assets.
“No formal distribution of these assets has ever taken place after 2009. It was YSR’s intention to distribute everything equally among his four grandchildren; indeed, this was his directive as well,” Vijayamma said in the note issued by her lawyer.
In the letter accessed by The Print, Vijayamma stated that Jagan allocated less assets to Sharmila than she was entitled to. “In addition to Saraswathi Cements, the land in Yelahanka—which was not even included in the MoU—also belongs to Sharmila. The money given to Sharmila was nothing other than the dividends accrued on her rightful share of the assets.”
The MoU being referred to was issued by Jagan in 2019 regarding the division of family property.
His remarks that he was “granting her a share in their family property only out of pure love and affection” sparked off a debate. Sharmila and Vijayamma accused Jagan of an unfair appropriation of assets after he claimed that all property was “self-acquired” and did not belong to his father.
Vijayamma dismissed Jagan’s earlier claims through her letter. “Everything in the MoU rightfully belongs to her, that is precisely why Jagan drafted the MoU. Thus far, Jagan has treated his nephew and niece unfairly regarding these assets; I hope that, someday, he will do right by them,” she wrote.
While YSRCP workers believe Vijayamma’s continued support to Sharmila could dent Jagan’s image, YSR’s associates and friends who The Print spoke to said that the letter was issued after Jagan refused to acquiesce to his mother’s demands.
YSRCP state spokesperson Rachamallu Shivaprasad Reddy strongly objected to the remarks made against Jagan, saying that they were “unfair and hurtful”.
Referring to Vijayamma’s notarized press note and her stance on the ongoing issue, he questioned why she did not express concern over the comments being made against Jagan and instead appeared to support the narrative against him.
However, Jagan’s family members who spoke to The Print said the letter was issued at the behest of the ruling Telugu Desam Party (TDP).
“It is a diversionary tactic employed by the Telugu Desam Party to deflect attention from the Hyderabad drug bust case where TDP MP Putta Mahesh Kumar was booked for consuming synthetic drugs,” a family member said.
The sibling rivalry
YSR was the chief minister of undivided Andhra Pradesh, when he died in a helicopter crash in 2009. After his death, Jagan quit the Congress party when party chief Sonia Gandhi refused to let him become the chief minister.
His decision to break away from the Congress and form a new party was supported by Vijayalakshmi and Sharmila, who joined him on a state-wide yatra. In 2011, Jagan formed the Yuvajana Sramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP), while he was jailed in 2012 by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in a disproportionate assets case. During his 16-month time in prison, Vijayamma and Sharmila toured Andhra canvassing for Jagan, which resulted in his electoral victory in 2019.
However, rifts within the family surfaced after Jagan issued the signed MoU following his electoral victory. In the MoU, he stated that transferring a certain portion of shares in Saraswati Power and Industries Private Limited and a few other properties was out of “pure love and affection” for his sister.
Both the mother and sister denounced Jagan’s actions stating that he misappropriated the family’s assets. Sharmila formed YSR Telangana Party, vowing to contest the 2023 assembly elections.
However, after a meeting with Sonia and Rahul Gandhi shortly before the Telangana elections in November 2023, she merged her party in the Congress and decided to move back to Andhra Pradesh. The Congress named her state chief and the party contested the 2024 general election and the assembly election in May that year.
The sibling rivalry led to Jagan and his wife filing a petition with the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) in 2024 to invalidate the transfer of Saraswati Power shares to Sharmila, mentioning that the transfer of shares could be possible only after his name was cleared in the cases against him filed by the CBI and the Enforcement Directorate.
In July 2025, the NCLT bench ruled in favour of Jagan stating that the shares to Sharmila should be revoked. Soon, Jagan withdrew the MoU within a few months in 2025, citing political differences and legal concerns with his sister.
While Vijayamma has sided with Sharmila and chosen to stay quiet until the publication of the note, Sharmila has been more open about her discord. More recently, she made a scathing remark saying that if one has a brother like Jagan, there is absolutely no need for any other enemies.
(Edited by Tony Rai)