Govt Unprepared For Drought, Harish Slams CM
“preference for politics and rushing off to Delhi and showing utter indifference”: BRS Leader Harish
HYDERABAD: The BRS on Monday castigated the Congress government and Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy for his “preference for politics and rushing off to Delhi and showing utter indifference” to the drought conditions in Telangana and for failing to come up with alternate employment avenues for farmers and farm workers who will be the worst hit in these conditions.
Addressing a press conference, former minister and senior BRS leader T. Harish Rao said, “While farmers are facing dangerously tough conditions, the government is also ignoring the drinking water needs of the people. Water that can sustain Hyderabad city, is being supplied from Sigur dam to beer companies as I speak. Is drinking water for people the priority or manufacturing liquor?”
“When the state is facing such tough conditions, the Chief Minster has rushed off to Delhi for political activities. What is the CM’s priority? It is his politics or farmers and people of Telangana,” Harish Rao asked adding that “last week, minister Ponguleti Srinivas Reddy said the CM will chair a Cabinet meeting only to discuss El Nino and drought today. What happened to that?”
He said the handling of Monday’s meeting of Rythu Vedikas typified the confusion in the Congress government. The meeting with farmers was scheduled at 11 am, saying that the CM would address them. All MLAs and elected representatives were asked to attend. “Then they said it was cancelled, only to say again that it was on at 1 pm, but at a little later they said the Deputy Chief Minister will address, and then it changed to the Chief Secretary and to agriculture minister,” Harish Rao said.
Harish Rao also asked why cases should not be filed against the Chief Minister and the others in the government for neglecting El Nino impact and for their lack of preparedness. “When farmers were arrested because they released water from Jurala, they face nob-bailable cases. But when drinking and irrigation water are diverted for beer production, why are no cases registered? Why should action not be taken against those who make such decisions? Why does this government treat farmers with such contempt,” Harish Rao asked.
