TDP rips thru NDA govt over special category status

New Delhi: In a vituperative and incisive attack on the Centre for its step-motherly treatment to the reorganised state of Andhra Pradesh, Telugu Desam MP Galla Jayadev on Friday scythed through the BJP’s ‘deliberate inaction’ in honoring the commitments made in the AP Sate Reorganisation Act, 2014 and in delivering special category status (SCS).

Jayadev, initiating the discussion on the no-confidence motion against the NDA in the Lok Sabha, termed the Telugu Desam Party’s struggle as Dharma Poratam against the Centre for betraying the trust of the people of Andhra Pradesh.

Jayadev, referring to the recent Mahesh Babu starrer "Bharat Ane Nenu", said the film had showed how important it is for a politician to keep the trust the people repose in him and pointed out that Prime Minister Narendra Modi broke it, doing, in the process, incalculable damage to AP, which needed help from the Centre as it had lost everything in the process of bifurcation.

Jayadev, despite attempts by the TRS members to disrupt his speech by raising slogans and shouting at the top of their voices when he said that the state was divided in an irrational and undemocratic manner, continued to focus on his address rather. As the Prime Minister sat beaming smiles, the TDP parliamentarian’s castigation of the NDA continued. He said his party moved the no-trust motion because of four reasons - lack of fairness, lack of trust, lack of priorities and continued bias against the state.

He said that after the division of the state, AP, ironically became the new state as it had nothing, not even capital, while for Telangana, everything was there already. Telangana is not the new state. It is AP which is the new state. After the division, AP was burdened with huge revenue deficit of Rs 16,000 crore, a Rs 1.3 lakh crore of loan burden, Rs 24,000 crore undivided loan responsibility for which interest is being paid by AP, which shattered our FRBM limits.

Jayadev recalled Narendra Modi, in the run up to the elections in 2014, saying that the Congress killed the mother and saved the child but he would save the mother too. "People of AP fell flat for this statement and supported him," Jayadev said.

Jayadev pointed out that the people of AP waited for four long years that Modi would save the mother but instead of saving AP, he had his Finance Minister announce that there would be no special category status for AP on March 7, 2018. The Finance Minister, at the behest of the Prime Minister, said that if the demand for SCS of AP is acceded, other states such as Bihar and Odisha will also demand. Which is a baseless argument.

“Do you have any respect for commitments made by your predecessors?” he asked.Jayadev sought to turn the tables against the BJP, YSRC, Congress and Jana Sena that the TDP had taken a U turn and was asking for SCS instead of package by saying that in the beginning the TD wanted only the SCS. “Till September 2016, we were demanding SCS but then Finance Minister made a statement that the special package would be given which would be equal to that of the SCS. Since then we have been waiting for the special package but not even a penny has come to the state," he said.

The Guntur Parliamentarian contended that financial support for creation of essential facilities in the new capital of AP would be provided by the Centre. The estimates pointed out that a sum of Rs 43,000 crore is required over a period of five years to construct essential infrastructure in Amaravati. But, the Centre has given just Rs 1,500 crore and now is screaming, instead of releasing more money, that AP has not submitted UCs in spite of submitting the same.

The PM is constructing Dholera city in Gujarat which is 80 km from Ahmedabad which would be twice the size of Delhi and six times bigger than Shanghai. "Is it wrong for the enterprising people of Andhra Pradesh to dream of having a world class capital?" he asked.