Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Sunday, August 21, said that Komatireddy Rajagopal Reddy joining the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) should be seen as the beginning of the end of the K Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR) government. Rajagopal Reddy, the legislator of Munugode, had resigned earlier this month as the representative of the constituency after his fallout with the Congress party. Addressing the gathering in Munugode, where Rajagopal Reddy officially joined the BJP, Shah said, “I want to say this: Elect Reddy in this bye-election and I will guarantee you that KCR’s corrupt government will vanish into thin air.” The date for the Munugode bye-poll is yet to be announced.
The Telangana government led by Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) had earlier promised that they would observe September 17 as Liberation Day (the day Hyderabad State was annexed to the Indian Union), but they went back on their promise, Shah pointed out. “Fearing Majlis (All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen or AIMIM), they are not celebrating Liberation Day, but do not worry people of Telangana and people of Munugode. In the next election, a BJP Chief Minister is going to come, and after that every September 17 we will observe Liberation Day,” he said.
Reminding of yet another failed promise by KCR, who had said that he will choose a Dalit leader as the first Chief Minister of Telangana, Shah said, “My Dalit brothers, remember this that if he (KCR) is elected again, KTR will replace KCR but no Dalit will become a Chief Minister.”
Attacking KCR’s “family rule”, Shah said that no job recruitment is taking place in the state. “Since 2014, there have been no recruitments in the education sector, if there are any recruitments, they are happening only in KCR’s family,” Shah said. He alleged that the Telangana government is not implementing the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana in the state as a result of which farmers are not getting insurance after crop damage due to floods. He further said, “KCR’s family is huge. He has his son [in power], his daughter… I do not have a problem with it, but why should the people of Telangana pay the cost of it? The Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project of the Telangana government has become the ATM machine of KCR’s family.”
Terming the KCR government as being “anti-farmer,” he said that the state government should procure paddy and rice from the farmers. “If they are not doing it, I assure you that the BJP government after coming to power will procure paddy and rice from the farmers.”
In a series of rhetorical questions, he asked the crowd whether KCR had provided Rs 3,000 to every unemployed individual, and whether he had constructed a super-speciality hospital in Nalgonda district as promised. “KCR said that each poor family would be provided a double-bedroom house. Forget giving the houses, he is creating hassles in the toilets which are being provided by Narendra Modi,” the Union Minister alleged.
He also attacked the TRS government for failing to reduce the petrol prices in the state, despite the Union government reducing it twice. The Minister claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had provided financial aid of Rs 2 lakh crore to the state and despite that, the state was reeling in debt. “I promise you this: Elect Rajagopal Reddy with a huge majority and help the BJP to form the government, and like the rest of the country, Telangana too will follow the path of development and achieve the objectives for which the state was formed.”