Raghavulu decries CM's apathy towards SCs, STs

Hyderabad: CPM State secretary BV Raghavulu on Thursday flayed Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy for undermining the importance of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes corporations. The government did not even appoint chairpersons for the SC and ST corporations for quite some time. Addressing a press conference, he ridiculed how the Chief Minister could claim to be a 'rythu bandhu' when he was ignoring the plight of farming community. He attributed the pathetic condition of farmers in the State to the inefficiency of the government. He demanded that the government should provide immediate succour to those farmers who suffered crop loss due to untimely rains. Raghavulu made it clear that their party would not stop agitating against power hike and fuel surcharge adjustment (FSA), until the government withdrew them. The State government was looting public by imposing heavy charges on power, he criticised. The government should stop burdening public through hike of charges as they could not bear the brunt, he said. The CPM leader demanded the government to conduct elections to local bodies without any delay, besides adequately increasing pensions to widows, physically handicapped and old age people. He slammed the government for protecting liquor mafia for the sake of income through Excise Department.