Don’t squander money on pet schemes : JC to Naidu

Anantapur: Anantapur MP and former minister J C Diwakar Reddy said here on Saturday that there was no need to levy additional taxes in the State Budget, as all taxes have already been imposed. Speaking to the media, he criticised Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu for wasting Rs 350 crore on implementing unproductive welfare schemes, which would only make the people lazy.

When he questioned Naidu about such schemes, Naidu had told him that he loved the people of the State and wanted them to lead a happy life. His reply was that they would become lazy, indifferent and lethargic. “Hard working people would never starve. Although the Chief Minister has affection for the people, he should not indulge in such wastage of public money,” Diwakar Reddy said.

Coming down heavily on the BJP and the Congress leaders for ‘cheating’ the people of Andhra Pradesh during the elections on the issue of granting special status, he said the NDA government could amend the law for granting the status, if it really wanted to. He lashed out at the Centre for coming up with ‘silly’ alibis, leaving the people in the lurch. “If there is a will, there is a way,” he observed.

The MP lamented that only the writs of the Prime Minister and the Chief Ministers were prevailing and Parliament and Assembly sessions were a waste of time. Such a situation was not visualised by the founding-fathers of the Constitution. He said actor Pawan Kalyan, instead of making statements, should explain his methods of agitation against the Centre and the State for securing special status. He was ready to join the agitation, if Pawan Kalyan showed the way.