Lokesh covers 72.3 km in six days

Tirupati: TDP national general secretary Nara Lokesh has so far covered 72.3 km in six days while on the sixth day he walked 13.8 km as part of his ongoing Yuva Galam padayatra in Chittoor district. He continued his padayatra on Wednesday from Kammanapalli Kasturba School. At the start, he posed for selfies with party workers, youth and women as part of 'Selfie with Lokesh.'

En route, he interacted with sugarcane farmer Venkataramana who showed him the making of jaggery. The farmer told Lokesh that he could get only Rs 50,000 income for Rs 70,000 expenditure. Later, he also interacted with construction labourers, women and others.

The construction labourers said that they were not getting work due to the abnormal hike in cement and sand prices. Even after paying Rs 5,000 for one truck of sand they could not get quality sand as all the sand was being transported to neighbouring Karnataka. Lokesh assured them of bringing the old sand policy after coming back to power.

A woman complained that she was not getting Amma Vodi as the income certificate showed Rs 8 lakh income for one acre waste land. People of Valmiki community told Lokesh that several of them have been going to other States to find livelihood as there are no opportunities here. They asked him to include them in STs which was earlier promised by YS Jagan Mohan Reddy during his padayatra.

At Kolamasanapalli, he interacted with women and criticised the Chief Minister for ignoring his promises made to the women like giving pension for 45 years, total prohibition of liquor, giving Amma Vodi to all children in the family and mentioned about the insecurity being faced by the women now. He said that women welfare was at its best during Naidu's government and cited Pasupu-Kumkuma, Thalli Bidda express etc., He also observed the boundary stones relating to the land resurvey at Nakkapalli of Palamaer constituency where the villagers told him that after resurvey, the officials are showing lesser extent of land to them. While talking to the SC community people he said that all the welfare programmes of SCs which were abolished by the present government will be reintroduced by the TDP government.