: Leader of the Opposition in the Legislative Council C. Ramachandraiah has demanded that Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu reveal his source of information that a single individual from Hyderabad disclosed Rs. 10,000 crore under the Income Disclosure Scheme. The statement of Mr. Naidu has snowballed into a controversy.
Addressing a press conference here on Thursday, Mr. Ramachandraiah said the Central government made a commitment that information about those who disclosed income under the scheme would be kept secret.
Under these circumstances, how Mr. Naidu managed to gain access to such highly confidential information, Mr. Ramachandraiah questioned. He said the person who gave such information to Mr. Naidu should be prosecuted. The Chief Minister’s statement was a tactic to divert public attention from the corruption in the Telugu Desam Party, he alleged.
‘Outrageous claims’
The Congress leader ridiculed the claims of Mr. Naidu that he would make Andhra Pradesh Number One state in the country by 2030 and Amaravati the fifth best city in the world by 2050. Every person who believed in the Indian Constitution should condemn such claims. Constitutionally, Mr. Naidu would be in power only till 2019 and all claims made beyond that were mere conjecture. The claims made by a person of the stature of Chief Minister were tantamount to deception, Mr. Ramachandraiah said.
There was nothing wrong in setting goals and targets. Governments were always trying to achieve targets in literacy, population control, poverty eradication, infant mortality, woman empowerment, and other human development indicators and officials work to achieve them. But setting targets for the building of Amaravati and financial growth were totally wrong, Mr. Ramachandraiah said.
