Now, fighting over colours!
After fighting over power, water, sharing of assets of institutions, division of employees and others, the dispute between the two Telugu States boiled down to colours last week in giving a fresh dab of paint to Nagarjunasagar Project. After bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh, the management of two major multi-purpose projects Srisailam and Nagarjunasagar went to AP and TS respectively.
The Irrigation Department of Telangana has decided to get the NSP structure repainted recently as part of the maintenance work and accordingly contractors were told to apply the prime and two coats of paint. However, AP Agriculture Minister P. Pulla Rao took a strong objection when information about the NSP getting painted in pink, the colour associated with the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) in Telangana, went to his knowledge.
He questioned how a “national” project would be painted in a colour associated with a regional party.
Suspecting an unwanted ‘controversy’ the irrigation officials of Telangana tried to put an end to the issue by stating that pink was the primer and blue would be painted on it.
Demon(etisation) demons
Demonetisation blues are continuing to haunt the State Government more than eight months after the process was set in motion by the Centre.
The impact of demonetisation on the State finances could be gauged from the fact that Finance Minister Eatala Rajender, who is not known to open up freely, explained the difficulties being faced in ensuring payment of wages to workers.
The State has no doubt received close to ₹60,000 crore new currency post demonetisation, but over 95% of the new notes were in ₹2,000 denomination.
With the wages for labourers and purchases of farmers for agriculture being in hundreds of rupees only, it is indeed a tall order for the State to cope with the payments in smaller denomination.
Going by the Finance Minister’s confidence that the Reserve Bank of India will pump in cash in banking system of the State in smaller denomination, one can only hope that workers, agriculture labour in particular, are not put to inconvenience in the crop season.
Treading softly
The Telangana government is apparently taking precaution not to enter into a tussle with the Centre on a legislation to do with seed.
While there is a National Seed Act 1966 which was redrafted five years ago but not tabled in Parliament, Telangana government has proposed its own legislation in the matter to deal with spurious seed and companies selling it.
To avoid conflict of interest and legal wrangles, the State government was said to have decided to send its draft proposals to the Centre before tabling it in the legislature.
Though both the Acts at a glance have similar elements, the duplication of legislation could lead to confusion among seed producers and farmers.
Will the Centre ask the State to shelve its Act?
Fair price shop dealers to shut down!
Imagine what will happen to the public distribution system if fair price shop dealers shut down their businesses.
That is what they threatened to do last week after an aborted protest demonstration to focus on the unviable nature of their business near the Chief Minister’s bungalow at Begumpet.
In fact, about 200 of them in Hyderabad have already addressed letters to Civil Supplies Department asking it to wind up their dealerships.
On the other hand, the dealers have announced a strike from July 15.
The dealers have highlighted that the government paid minimum wage of ₹8,000 a month but the dealers did not even get commission of ₹3,000 a month. Minus rent for their accommodation and other incidentals, the expenditure far outstripped earnings.
(B. Chandrasekhar, M. Rajeev, Nikhila Henry, N. Rahul)
