Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader Bhatti Vikramarka Mallu has called for a bandh of combined Mahabubnagar district on October 21 blaming the government for the submergence of the Kalwakurthy LIP pump house and the undemocratic way of preventing Congress leaders from visiting the site.
Mr. Bhatti along with MLAs Duddila Sreedhar Babu and T. Jagga Reddy and MLC T. Jeevan Reddy were arrested at Veldanda while they were going to inspect the site. Mr. Bhatti argued with the police against their detention but to no avail. Police blocked their vehicles and did not permit them arguing that there was no permission to visit the site.
He argued with the police on how ministers and TRS MLAs were being allowed but not Congress leaders. “Why is the Chief Minister afraid of Congress leaders’ visit?”, he asked and said that the police were busy arresting only the Congress leaders.
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“It is time people realise how dangerous this strategy of the government was as more than ₹1,000 crore public money was lost,” he said, adding that this was due to corrupt practices. He alleged that KCR was executing these projects by making retired engineer Muralidhar Rao sign, according to his wishes. Despite several experts objecting to underground pump sets of PRLIS near the KLIS project, the government went ahead to benefit the contractors, he added.
Mr. Jagga Reddy said people have every right to know about the accident and demanded that only a CBI inquiry into the redesigning of projects can reveal the truth. He said once Congress comes back to power it would not leave anyone involved in corruption in the irrigation projects.