Suryapet (Nalgonda): Telangana people should throw away the Seemandhra parties, Telangana Rashtra Samiti chief Kalvakuntla Chandrasekhar Rao thus gave a clarion call on Sunday. Addressing a huge public meeting ‘Samara Bheri’ here, he came down heavily on Congress, Telugu Desam and YSR Congress Party and branding them as anti-Telangana parties. “We don’t want either Rajanna Rajyam or Chandranna Rajyam. We want Telangana Rajyam which benefits the people of Telangana,” he thundered to the applause of the audience.
Why the people of this region should depend on the mercy of Seemandhra parties, he asked them in equal measure. “The Congress high command only invited us for talks. At one point of time we even were ready to merge TRS into Congress for the sake of Telangana, but they deceived us,” he said.
Seemandhra parties should be discarded as Rajasekhara Reddy, Chandrababu Naidu and Jaganmohan Reddy had a history of opposing the demand of statehood to Telangana region, he said.
“We have seen the nine-year regime of Chandranna Rajyam, during which there were only retirements and no recruitments of jobs. In the name of administrative reforms, he recruited contract employees whose life is worse than bonded labour,” he said.
Criticising Babu further, KCR said he lost credibility in Telangana as he was instrumental in opposing the Centre’s December 9 statement on Telangana. “Credibility is not a commodity which can be bought from Singapore or sold in Heritage shop,” he said sarcastically.
Though Chandrababu was making many promises, he was not going to come back to power, he felt.
Continuing his tirade on YSR Congress Party, KCR said, “Rajanna Rajyam is the rule which looted water, funds and employment from Telangana.” YSR was responsible for the loot of water share which belonged to Nalgonda and Mahbubnagar districts and diverted to Pothireddypadu. YSR’s projects like Pulichintala and Polavaram devastated the lives of people in Telangana, he alleged.
“A number of projects in this region including Sagar Left Bank Canal (SLBC), Pranahita-Chevella, Nettempadu and Kalvakurti Lift irrigation projects are still pending in spite of Jalayagnam. Now Vijayamma says that Jagan will come out of jail and complete Polava- ram,” KCR said. “We don’t want Rajanna Rajyam which submerges even Bhadradri Rama,” he declared.
During the YSR rule, 10,000 farmers and 500 handloom workers committed suicides, he alleged. “YS Rajasekhara Reddy handed over Obulapuram mines to his son Jagan and 1,47,000 acres of Bayyaram iron mines to his daughter and son-in-law,” he alleged.
Referring to the allegations of YSRCP that there was a conspiracy behind sending Jagan to jail, KCR asked, “Do they mean that the High Court and the Supreme Court conspired and put Jagan in jail?”
Speaking about the issue of fluorosis in Nalgonda, KCR promised to get irrigation water to 12 lakh acres of land in the district.
Quoting a World Health Organisation (WHO) report, he said: “If we don’t act now, the district would turn into a no-man zone.” Taking reference to the controversy of TJAC Chairman Prof Kodandaram’s comments on Geetha Reddy, he said that it was not correct to make it as an issue even after Kodandram apologised politely to the latter. The TRS President made some promises at ‘Samara Bheri’ meeting. Widows and senior citizens would be granted Rs 1000 and the physically challenged Rs 1,500 as monthly pension in the Telangana state, he said.
He also promised a better form Arogyasri scheme to include employees, pay-scales to state government employees on a par with the Central scales, regularisation of contract employees and full utilization of about 1300 tmcft of water to irrigate one crore acres of land in Telangana districts. KCR declared that, Telangana state will be reorganized into 24 districts to reach out to the people, as suggested by some retired senior bureaucrats.
Rao appealed to the people to elect more MPs and MLAs from the party to help it put forth Telangana demand more forcefully. “We have a two-pronged strategy. One is movement and the other politics. JAC will lead the movement and in politics if our elected representatives are more, we will achieve our own political identity,” he explained.
Quoting legendary poet Bhatruhari’s couplets, KCR concluded: “We will fight till the end, as the heroes will not desert the battle in middle. We will achieve Telangana and lead our lives in dignity.” [The Hans India]