Sunday, Nov 17, 2002
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Andhra Pradesh-Hyderabad
By Our Special Correspondent
Addressing a press conference here on Saturday, the Congress MLAs -- N. Raghuveera Reddy, P. Laxmaiah, Venugopal Reddy, A.Vivekananda Reddy and A. Ramnarayan Reddy -- accused the Government of trying to divert the attention of people from the malpractices by blaming the Congress of working against the interests of the State. Demanding action against all those involved in the malpractices under the Revenue Recovery Act, they said it defied all reason that the Government preferred silence to taking action against Ministers involved. Only the lower level officials had been "caught'' but no bigwigs involved in the rice scandal ever faced action. The Congress was demanding the House Committee as it would go a long way in checking malpractices immediately and there could be no political motives to the demand. It was inane to claim that the Congress would use it to ask the Centre to stop assistance to the State. The Chief Minister, N. Chandrababu Naidu, should keep in mind that the House had unanimously passed a resolution seeking more rice under the programme. In fact, the Congress suggested to seek 40 lakh tonnes and not 20 lakh tonnes as was sought by the TDP. If the latter were sincere it should not have stuck to its demand of just 20 lakh tonnes. The party countered the TD argument that the Congress was against the poor and said it was only against "the anti-poor policies'' of the Government. The rice that should have, as a matter of right, gone to the poor was in the hands of Telugu Desam functionaries and Ministers, hence the Congress was petitioning the Centre to check the malpractices. If the party had gone to court, it was also to seek action against erring persons. A probe was necessary as the Government had admitted 20 per cent corruption in the programme which alone amounted to Rs.700 crores. Was it a small amount to be ignored, they asked. In fact, it could be as high as Rs. 1,000 crores, they argued. Moreover, it was not just the Congress that was hitting out in the matter, the BJP, an ally of the ruling party, also had levelled similar charges. In Nellore, the Information Minister, S. Chandramohan Reddy, got rice to his supporters for Rs. 5.50 per kg while the same was given to others for Rs. 7.50 per kg. Five TD MLAs of Nellore protested over the matter. Minister, N. Kistappa, had admitted at a press conference that he had lent his machinery (poclains) for works.
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