KARIMNAGAR: Parties are willing to try anything to get the people to vote for them. With this spirit of throwing everything and seeing what sticks, Congress party is sending TPCC president N Uttam Kumar Reddy and former Jagtial MLA T Jeevan Reddy all the way to Dubai to woo families of migrant workers working in the Gulf to vote for the party.
The two Reddys will be travelling to the UAE on November 9, where they will explain the emigrants what Congress has in plan for them and what it would add in its manifesto for them. The idea seems to be that the workers would later call their families and convince them to vote for Congress.
The Congress party has consistently attacked Telangana Rashtra Samithi for abandoning migrant workers and their families. Many people in North Telangana, especially in erstwhile Nizamabad district and in the newly-formed Jagtial district, depend on remittances from emigrants. Some estimates put the number of such dependent people at 10 per cent of the population in these regions. It is his section of population, apparently disillusioned by the TRS and feeling ignored in general, that the Congress wants to tap with its ‘Gulf outreach’.
Speaking to Express, Jeevan Reddy listed out the reasons why people were upset with the TRS. “TRS has done nothing for the youth stuck in Gulf countries, stuck in the harshest environment imaginable. Some of them are stuck in jails there and the government has done nothing to help them. According to a report, more than 1,000 migrant workers died in the region in the last four-and-a-half years,” he said.
Explaining what Congress would do to address these concerns, Reddy said, “As soon as Congress comes to power in the State, we will announce and provide exgratia of `5 lakh to kin of workers who lost their lives in a Gulf country. We will also arrange for the return of dead bodies from the countries to their home towns. During our trip to Dubai, we will explain all these things that will make up the ‘Telangana NRI Policy’.”
Meanwhile, families of some deceased emigrant workers released a list of demands to political parties. They claimed they would vote for the party that accepted these demands. Some of these demands include an exgratia of `10 lakh to deceased’s next of kin and legal support for workers stuck in Gulf jails. The families ask that presidents of all political parties accept these demands. And who ever forms the next government, the first file to be processed by it should be the Telangana NRI policy file.