Hanumakonda, Aug.24 (NSS): CPI State secretary and Kothagudem MLA Koonamneni Sambasiva Rao on Saturday said the six guarantees and other promises made by the newly-formed Congress government in Telangana State were being implemented in a one-step forward and two steps backward manner. He urged the government to immediately provide Rythu Bharosa incentive to all eligible farmers and immediately take steps to implement promises such as crop insurance scheme, new ration cards, houses, house sites and increase in pensions. He said even after the completion of the kharif season, there appears to be a delay in the name of opinion poll for the modalities. He suggested that the draft of the newly drafted RoR Act in place of Dharani should be discussed in more depth and added that a new RoR Act should be brought in after taking everyone’s views.
He warned the Congress government that while it is true that the state’s financial situation is in disarray, there would be opposition from the people if the implementation of the promises continues like this. The three-day CPI State committee’s construction meeting at Hanamkonda, which has been going on since the 22nd of this month, came to an end on Saturday. CPI National Secretaries Dr K. Narayana, Syed Aziz Pasha, National Executive Members Chada Venkata Reddy, Pasya Padma, National Committee members Palla Venkat Reddy, State Secretariat Members Takkellapalli Srinivasan, N. Balamallesh, E.T. Narasimha, Kalavena Shankar, M. Balanarasimha and other leaders participated in the meeting.
Speaking at the valedictory session, Koonamneni Sambasiva Rao expressed happiness that the promise of free bus to women in the state was continuing properly. However, he said the promise of increasing Aarogyasri scheme health coverage to Rs 10 lakh was not being implemented as expected due to the existing arogyasri dues. “While the promises of free electricity up to 200 units and a gas cylinder for Rs 500 are being implemented to some extent, the promise of the crop loan waiver scheme has not been fully implemented due to various technical reasons and lack of ration cards for all the poor. Referring to the announcement of the State government that the loan waiver of Rs 31,000 crore would be completed by August 15, he said only Rs 18,540.24 crore had been disbursed to 21.66 lakh farmers in three instalments, and added that many had not been given loans due to ration card, passbook, provisions to pay the above amount if the loan amount was more than Rs 2 lakh and other technical reasons. “Farmers are not satisfied with the statements made by the government on this issue and there is a lot of discontent and frustration among the farmers,” he said.
He warned that if the government does not make a clear statement immediately and complete the loan waiver of Rs 2 lakh to the farmers without any conditions at the earliest, the government would have to pay a heavy price. He said in the recent budget session of the State assembly, a lot of time was wasted on allegations, counter-allegations and abuses by the ruling and the opposition parties and added that the discussion on people’s issues was negligible. He urged the government to change the manner in which the assembly sessions should be held and added that there should be a platform for meaningful discussions in the assembly so that the problems of the people can be resolved.
