Hyderabad: Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao appealed to the Opposition parties on Sunday not to curse their own state for the sake of “silly politics”.
While replying to the discussion on the Budget in the House, the Chief Minister said that whoever puts obstacles in the way of the growth of the state for silly politics will be ruined.
He said that nationwide there is discussion on the economic slowdown and it would obviously have an impact on the state budget too.
Refuting the allegation of the Congress members that the TRS has made Telangana a debt-ridden state, Mr Rao said the government is taking loans and investing in irrigation projects.
On the day the separate state came into existence, the state debt was Rs 75,000 crore. The TRS government has repaid around Rs 7,000 crore and the current debt is Rs 69,000 crore, apart from the loans taken for the irrigation projects.
“We are not taking loans for our houses, we are investing in projects. Through the Kaleshwaram Project we will provide water to irrigate 40 to 44 lakh acres in the coming monsoon. If there is water then crops, fish and prawn production automatically improves and we will clear the debt in just two years,” the Chief Minister said.
Stating that taking a loan is not a crime, the Chief Minister pointed out that the FRMB limit is 25 per cent and Prime Minister Narendra Modi is trying to reduce the limit. “I told the PM to his face ‘don’t curtail the gro-wth of the states.’ Telang-ana is one of the five states generating more revenue for the country.”
He said that the allegation made by the Congress that the ST and SC Sub-Plan funds were diverted is absolutely baseless, and in fact the state government released 15.4 per cent in funding to SCs though their population is 15 per cent and for STs, 9.3 per cent funds were released though their population is nine per cent.
He said that Telangana will soon utilise the 575 TMC of water from the Godavari through irrigation projects on the river in Telangana.
The Chief Minister told the House that very soon he and AP Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy will meet in regard to sharing of Godavari waters and “we will bring 60 TMC of Godavari water to Srisailam and Nagarjuna Sagar. The AP chief minister has agreed to reduce the height of the Polavaram Project from 152 metres to 145 metres and he will discuss with the Odisha government how to reduce the submergence area so that the flood water can be diverted to the Krishna River,” Mr Rao added.
He said that during the late Rajasekhar Reddy’s regime, he had planned the Polavaram and Pulich-intala projects and when the Telangana people agitated, he annou-nced the Tummidihatti project, but it could not be launched.
He explained that due to less water being available in the Tummidihatti project, they decided to lift water from Medigadda.
Referring to the allegations of the Congress that the TRS government has failed to provide jobs to the unemployed, the chief minister said that the state government has issued notification to fill up 1,44,300 jobs and so far 1,17,717 jobs have been filled up.
He said that for the minorities the TRS has sanctioned Rs 3,994 crore in the past six years, whereas the Congress in its 10 years of rule had given only Rs 925 crore for the minorities.
In his three-hour reply, the chief minister touched on several issues and targeted the failures of the Congress and TD rule in the undivided state.
