Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) president and former chief minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao hit out at Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy accusing him of speaking about ‘human bombs’ and using ‘intimidating’ language against those who raise their voice on Congress government’s apathy towards farmers and ‘inept governance.’
Can a Chief Minister use such unwarranted words? Mr. Rao asked, alleging that a Minister in the Congress government threatened to slap farmers with footwear if they insist on Rythu Bandhu investment support.
“Such unwarranted behaviour is reflective of the intolerance of the persons at the helm in the Congress government to criticism of their incompetence,” the BRS supremo alleged. He was speaking at a public meeting called “Kadana Bheri” held in Karimnagar on Tuesday evening in the run-up to the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.
Mr. Rao sounded the poll bugle from Karimnagar, the political nerve centre of north Telangana. Calling Karimnagar, an epicentre of separate Telangana movement, Mr. Rao said the town played host to BRS (then TRS)’s mammoth public meetings such as “Simha Garjana” during the Statehood movement propelling it to its logical end.
After achieving Telangana, the BRS government nurtured the new State against all odds and developed it on all fronts in the last 10 years, he claimed, adding that Telangana was first in the country to implement landmark schemes such as Rythu Bandhu investment support scheme, supply piped drinking water to every household under the Mission Bhagiratha.
The Congress party came to power by making 420 promises and showed its incompetence in providing ₹15,000 investment support under the Rythu Bandhu , one tola gold under the Kalyana Lakshmi scheme, ₹500 bonus per quintal of paddy and so on.
He alleged that the distraught farmers were allowing the cattle to feed on their withering crops at several places due to lack of water supply. This is the precarious scenario prevailing in Telangana ahead of peak summer under the current Congress dispensation, he said.
Stating that the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project (KLIP) proved a boon for farmers, he accused the ruling Congress leaders of trying to defame the previous BRS government by magnifying the sinking of just two pillars of the Medigadda barrage of the KLIP without ensuring repairs to it.
The Bathukamma sari scheme implemented by the previous BRS government provided sustainable income to the weavers in Sircilla which reeled under a wave of suicides in the erstwhile united Andhra Pradesh. The ruling Congress leaders are frequently shuttling between Hyderabad and Delhi to send a portion of the loot to their bosses, Mr. Rao charged.
Training his guns on the BJP, he alleged that the BJP MP from Karimnagar Bandi Sanjay miserably failed to do anything for the development of Karimnagar constituency. Why should you vote for a party which did not even sanction a Navodaya Vidyalaya and a single medical college to Telangana? Mr. Rao said, calling upon people of the constituency to vote for the BRS candidate and former Karimnagar MP B. Vinod Kumar in the Lok Sabha elections.
Mr. Vinod Kumar and a host of other senior BRS leaders spoke. Party sources said that the BRS working president and Sircilla MLA K. T. Rama Rao could not attend the public meeting as he was indisposed.