Dalita Bandhu to start from Huzurabad ahead of bypoll

The scheme for financial empowerment of SCs will have budget of ₹ 1,000 crore a year and benefit 8 lakh families

Chief Minister K. Chandasekhar Rao holding a review meeting on the recently announced Dalit empowerment scheme with officials in Hyderabad on Sunday.

The State government has decided to kick-start Dalita Bandhu, the ambitious Dalit empowerment scheme aimed at providing financial assistance to Dalit (Scheduled Caste) families for making them financially self-sufficient.

Huzurabad constituency, represented by former Minister Eatala Rajender, had been selected for implementation of the pilot project. A release from the Chief Minister’s Office said the constituency had been selected in view of the fact that Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao had kick-started several of the welfare schemes from the district.

The district had been the starting point for intensified separate Statehood agitation with the TRS holding the ‘Telangana Simha Garjana’ which culminated in the formation of the separate State. The prestigious Rythu Bandhu which several States have emulated was also started from Karimnagar district and hence, selection of Huzurabad for implementation of the pilot project of the Dalit empowerment scheme.

Interestingly, the constituency is set to go for bypoll after Mr. Rajender, who was stripped off his portfolio, resigned from his MLA post and joined the BJP. The bypoll to the constituency has now turned out to be a battle of prestige between the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi and the Bharatiya Janata Party which made impressive gains in the State since past few months. The Congress too had shown indications of resurgence after the party high command promoted Malkajgiri MP A. Revanth Reddy as the Telangana party president.

Chief Minister K. Chandasekhar Rao, who held an elaborate review meeting on the recently announced Dalit empowerment scheme for providing financial assistance to Scheduled Castes for making them financially self-sufficient, said it will be named as Telangana Dalita Bandhu, on the lines of Rythu Bandhu investment assistance scheme launched in the interests of farmers. The scheme involving a budget outgo of ₹ 1,000 crore a year would benefit about eight lakh dalit families and the allocation, the government clarified, was over and above the allocations made under the SC sub-plan.

The date for the launch of the scheme would be announced soon.