Praja Rajyam Party senior leader C. Ramachandraiah has said the State continues to be in a financial chaos because of the ‘insensitive policies' of late Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy and the situation is no better under his successor K. Rosaiah.
“YSR has initiated all such programmes only to attract voters. Now the Government is not in a position to sustain them. Housing programme has collapsed. They are also going to withdraw gas subsidy of Rs. 25 per cylinder,” said Mr. Ramachandraiah addressing a press conference on Friday.
He said it was because of the financial mess that the Government was not being able to mobilise resources for even irrigation projects like Polavaram which were already begun. It was only after their party president Chiranjeevi had started the campaign that the Government came down and began taking steps to hasten the implementation of the project. The Chief Minister held a special meeting and ordered the officials concerned to take steps to see to it that the project was completed by 2014.
Mr. Ramachandraiah demanded that the Chief Minister give an assurance that Major Irrigation Minister Ponnala Lakshmaiah would not once again hinder the progress of the Polavaram project, as the Minister was solely responsible for the hurdle created earlier in the process of getting national project status for Polavaram.
He said the Praja Rajyam Party would continue its agitation till there was good progress in the project.
He charged a vernacular newspaper with carrying baseless reports only to malign his image and mar his political prospects, contrary to ethical journalism. Though there was no scope for any rift between him and Chiranjeevi, the newspaper carried reports creating doubts among the party workers.
He said Chiranjeevi had announced that the party would field its candidate in Rajya Sabha elections and there was no controversy surrounding this.
