Union Minister of State for Home Affairs G. Kishan Reddy on Wednesday asked the YSR Congress Party to focus on development instead of targeting political rivals.
Interacting with the media here on Wednesday, Mr. Kishan Reddy said, “We are aware of the situation and urge Chief Minister Y.S Jagan Mohan Reddy to restrain his leaders from indulging in such behaviour. The YSRCP got a huge mandate and it should not follow in the footsteps of the TDP.”
He said the State government would be committing a big mistake if it went ahead with its decision to introduce English medium from Classes 1 to 6 in all government schools from the next academic year..
‘Protect mother tongue’
Quoting the example of Uttar Pradesh, the Union Minister said, “After coming to power in the State, we proposed to convert all Hindi medium schools into English keeping in mind the best interests of the students, but we did not make it mandatory. We left the choice to the students, parents and teachers.”
At the recent global conference of Home Ministers in Australia attended by 71 countries, 30 representatives addressed the sessions only in their respective national languages or mother tongue. “It is the duty of the Central and State governments to protect ‘matru bhasha’ (mother tongue),” he said.
Referring to a comment made by YSRCP MP Vijaya Sai Reddy that the party was on good terms with the BJP at the Centre, but in the State things were different, Mr. Kishan Reddy said, “The Centre and the State should have a good relationship. However in the State, we are rivals. The BJP therefore is duty-bound to oppose all anti-people decisions of the government.”
Meet against terror funding
The Union Minister said India would host the next ‘No money for terror’ conference some time in November or December in 2020. “I am just back from this year’s conference that was held in Australia and India’s proposal to host it was accepted,” he added.
“There were also representatives from various intelligence agencies, banks, UN and financial institutions and we decided that strong steps will taken to stop all forms of terror funding,” he said.
“We will immediately ban or blacklist any bank or institution that indulges in funding terror groups, knowingly or unknowingly,” Mr. Kishan Reddy said.
