YSR Congress party on Friday ridiculed the attempts of the Bharatiya Janata party Andhra Pradesh unit to raise funds through begging for extending relief to the flood-affected people of Rayalaseema and south coastal Andhra districts.
For the last two days, the BJP leaders and cadre have been moving around different parts of the state to collect donations from people under the direction of BJP state president Somu Veerraju. It is not exactly known how much money they had collected till now.
But YSRC general secretary V Vijay Sai Reddy made fun of the BJP leaders’ attempt.
“Let them not resort to this publicity stunts. It is enough if they can secure funds due to the state from the Centre,” he said.
The issue came up for discussion at the YSRC parliamentary party meeting at Tadepalli on Friday under the leadership of chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy.
The chief minister gave directions to the MPs on how to build pressure on the Centre to secure funds to the state.
Sai Reddy said the Centre was showing step-motherly attitude towards Andhra Pradesh.
“Despite repeated reminders, the Centre has not been taking any responsibility in getting Rs 6,112 crore from Telangana towards power purchase costs,” he said.
Though the Centre was supposed to release Rs 22,940 crore under resource gap funding, it had given only Rs 4,117 crore.
“If the state gets what is due from the Centre, the state will turn fertile,” he said.
At the parliamentary party meeting, the chief minister found fault with the Centre for separating drinking water component and electricity component from Polavaram irrigation project.
“A national project is a combination of all the three components. How can centre deny it?” he asked.
He asked the MPs to try hard to get the revised estimates of Rs 55,657 crore for Polavaram project.
“In spite of the financial crisis, the state has spent Rs 2,104 crore, which has not yet been reimbursed by the Centre,” he said.
Jagan also accused the Centre of imposing cuts in the loans in the name of over-borrowing.
“Even though out government is not responsible for the excess loans taken by the previous TDP government, the Centre is imposing cuts in net borrowing limit now, which is not correct,” he said.
