YSR Telangana Party (YSRTP) president Y.S. Sharmila has announced her intention to launch a marathon padayatra covering the entire length and breadth of the State to connect with maximum number of people possible.
The walkathon, Praja Prasthana Yatra, will start from October 20 and would continue for a year, the time by which the State is expected to be in an election mode. The padayatra, according to Ms. Sharmila, is aimed at educating people on the failures of the TRS government in fulfilling the aspirations of all sections of the society.
The event will start from Chevella, the place from where her father and former Chief Minister of united AP Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy started his marathon padayatra in 2002 and rode to power with a huge majority in 2004. It would cover 90 of the 119 constituencies, except those falling under the GHMC limits, and end at Chevella again.
This is not the first time Ms. Sharmila is embarking upon such a massive walkathon. She embarked upon padayatra in 2012 when her brother and the present AP Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy was imprisoned. She walked through 14 districts of the erstwhile united State covering over 3,000 km during the yatra christened “maro praja prasthanam”.
Ms. Sharmila alleged that family rule is prevailing in Telangana and Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao’s government took several anti-people measures. The BJP and the Congress too colluded with the TRS government leaving the State without an opposition that firmly opposed the government’s “anti-people” measures.
“We will instil confidence among the people that YSR Telangana Party is the only alternative in the State,” she said. She launched a broadside against the ruling TRS and the Chief Minister alleging that in spite of the promise made by the TRS to provide job to each household, suicides by youth continue to be rampant in the State.
Over 7,000 farmers too committed suicide in the past seven years as the ruling party did not implement its promise of loan waiver. This could be seen from the fact that surveys conducted by independent agencies revealed that 91% of the farmers were saddled with debt of at least ₹1.5 lakh while there is no one listening to the plight of the 16 lakh tenant farmers, she said.
The promise of three acre land each to all dalit families too is not being kept while there is significant rise in the atrocities against dalits. Liquor sale had turned rampant as also atrocities against women. “There is a direct correlation between the increased liquor sale and attacks on women,” she averred adding there is no clarity on how the more than ₹4 lakh crore loans obtained from different sources were spent.
