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What AP gets, Telangana too should get, says TRS
The issue of special category status to Andhra Pradesh generated heat in Parliament on Tuesday with the government seeking to turn the tables on the Congress insisting that the promise was not made as part of the AP Reorganisation Act when separate Telangana State was carved out of the undivided state.
New Delhi: The issue of special category status to Andhra Pradesh generated heat in Parliament on Tuesday with the government seeking to turn the tables on the Congress insisting that the promise was not made as part of the AP Reorganisation Act when separate Telangana State was carved out of the undivided state. Amidst the claims of the Centre’s all-out help to AP, a TRS member pitched in to highlight the injustice by stating that what AP gets, Telangana should also get.
“I am a student of Law. Nowhere in the Act, this is mentioned. The bill was brought up by the UPA Government. It does not contain the words of 'special category' status," Parliamentary Affairs Minister M Venkaiah Naidu said in Lok Sabha, amid protests from Congress members who staged a brief walkout.
Taking potshots at Congress, Venkaiah Naidu accused the opposition party of being "silent" and "forgetting" the promise when in power while turning "violent" on the issue when out of power, just to score some political points.
Naidu stressed that the government has taken "keen interest" on the development of Andhra Pradesh soon after it took office and had taken a number of decisions to help the state, including on the ambitious Polavaram multi-purpose irrigation project.
Asserting that the government has gone "little out of the way" to help Andhra Pradesh, he reeled out names of a series of projects and institutes that have been granted to Andhra Pradesh, including an IIT and an IIM,
Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, ESSO –NIOT Ocean research facility sanctioned, Polavaram Project, National Kamadhenu Research Centre, National Institute of Fisheries Education, Solar Energy Corporation of India, upgradation of Vizag and Tirupati Airports.
He also mentioned modernisation of Vijayawada Airport, multi-modal logistic park at Kakinada and container corporation in Vizag among other projects to ensure its speedy development. "We will take care of Telangana also," he said.
Countering the Union minister, TRS MP AP Jitender Reddy said whatever has been given in the Section of 94 of the AP Reorganisation Act has not been done for Telangana.Whatever Andhra Pradesh State gets, Telangana State also has to be given. This is my submission. When next time Venkaiah Naidu gives out a big list, he should also come out with the same list for Telangana, he added.
Listing out some of the promises in the Act, Jitender Reddy said, “AIIMS has not been given. Tribal University has not been given, Horticulture University has not been given, National Project for Irrigation in Telangana has not been given, High Court bifurcation has not been done, Industrial corridor has not been given. CAMPA funds not given. Backward Region Funds also not given".
Jitender Reddy wound up his argument thus: "So, all these items are still pending. Only one-sided bifurcation as per AP State Reorganisation Act has been done. When Venkaiah Naiduji has given such a big list,
in the same fashion, he should have also said that so and so things have been done in Telangana also. But nothing has been said by our Minister. There should not be any partiality. The division has taken place and both the States have to be treated equally.”
