CM-Speaker rift widens further

Hyderabad: The constitution of the departmentally related standing committees (DRSC) in the state Assembly has taken a curious twist with the Chief Minister, N Kiran Kumar Reddy reportedly insisting on his choice to prevail in the final lists. Kiran Kumar Reddy is said to have directed the officials of the Assembly to furnish the CMO with all the details pertaining to formation of the DRSCs. Sources have said that the Chief Minister was a bit annoyed with the way the whole gamut of issues involved in the formation of the DRSCs was handled by the Speaker's office. The secretary of the State legislature has been tasked with the job of responding to the CMO's directives. Moves were afoot for constituting twelve DRSCs by April 9. The new standing committees, expected to function on the lines of the parliamentary standing committees, would have to sit and discuss the demands on subjects pertaining to their respective departments. In fact unlike the previous speakers, Nadendla Manohar has been playing a proactive role in highlighting certain major issues of people such as the fluoride problem in Nalgonda and mining related issues in the agencies of Araku (Visakhapatnam district) tiger reserve in Kawal ( Adilabad district) and the living conditions of Chenchus in Mahabubnagar. Some of the Ministers were said to be unhappy with the way issues pertaining to their departments were being dealt with in the process. They had reportedly taken up their grievance with the CM. They complained that their importance was being undermined. Taking cognizance of the representations of his cabinet colleagues, Kiran had sought to address issues of public importance by the ministers concerned instead of allowing the Speaker to handle them. Right from the Araku Declaration to his recent review of the Singareni Collieries affairs, every move of the Speaker, observers feel, has been adding to the gulf between the two offices. The way an SCCL official was warned during the visit of the speaker to the Collieries at Kothagudem proved to be the proverbial last straw. The Chief Minister, sources said, is now keen on dealing with all such issues on his own. The gap between the two offices started widening right from the day Manohar pressed for division on the floor of the house during a discussion on a TDP sponsored motion seeking implementation of the SC categorization in allocation of funds for the SC, ST sub- plans. The treasury benches which opposed the motion were irked by the Speaker's decision. Reddy reportedly decided to shoulder the task of constituting the DRSCs at his level and the lists are being prepared as desired by his camp which is said to be considering the option of giving two or three DRSC chairmen posts to Opposition parties particularly Telugu Desam and Left Parties. On the other hand, the government has issued a GO to take up recruitment of 47 new posts to support the functioning of new the DRSCs system. The new posts include one Joint secretary, one deputy secretary, three assistant secretaries, six section officers, eight Telugu and four English reporters and twelve research officers and equivalent number of data entry officers.