HYDERABAD: Stating that the Congress government in Telangana gave a total of 50,000 jobs in the last 10 months at the rate of eight jobs per hour, Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy on Saturday said that in stark contrast, the BJP-led dispensation at the Centre has betrayed the youth with its empty promises.
The chief minister also claimed that several welfare schemes promised as part of the ‘six guarantees’ of the Congress, including free bus travel to women, free electricity of up to 200 units, bonus on paddy, were implemented fully, up to saturation point.
Revanth alleged that the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi do not have a success story to go to the people with and hence where choosing to level baseless allegations against Congress governments.
He was speaking at a press conference in Mumbai along with Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu and Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar as part of his party’s election campaign for Maharashtra Assembly elections.
Responding as PM made allegations, says CM
Responding to the allegations levelled by prime minister and Union Home Minister Amit Shah that Congress governments have failed to fulfil their poll promises, Revanth said that he does not usually pay any attention to the accusations levelled by BJP leaders. “However, I am responding now as the allegations came from the prime minister himself,” the chief minister said, adding that Modi was disseminating lies about Telangana and on the six guarantees.
“As long as Modi does not eschew uttering lies, I will not stop speaking truths,” Revanth said, adding that he has the responsibility of giving facts to the people of Maharashtra.
Terming Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar “Gujarat Ghulams” (Gujarat slaves), he said that they want to come to power again by uttering one lie after the other. “I am your next door neighbour. I am your brother. Teach BJP a lesson by defeating it. If the BJP wins, Maharashtra will have to lose its future. As many as 17 major investments have already shifted to Gujarat from Maharashtra,” he said.
‘Loan waiver led to drop in farmer suicides’
Stating that Telangana used to be second after Maharashtra in farmer suicides in the country, Revanth said that his government had implemented loan waiver of up to Rs 2 lakh to address the issue. He accused the previous BRS government, and the BJP-led dispensation at the Centre, of not implementing any farmer welfare schemes and for not giving MSP to agriculture products. He was also critical of BJP for bringing three contentious farm laws, which were later repealed owing to farmers’ agitation.
“We have waived agriculture loans up to Rs 2 lakh as promised. As many as 22,22,067 farmers got relief as the state government spent Rs 17,869 crore for waiving their loans up to Rs 2 lakh. If anyone wants data, I can give all the details including the name of each farmer who benefited from the loan waiver,” the chief minister said.
‘Counter forced PM to delete his tweet’
Accusing BJP of running a malicious campaign against Congress governments, he said that the prime minister had referred to Telangana in one of his tweets with false claims. “I responded to it with a detailed reply. Thereafter, the prime minister deleted his message on X,” he said.
Reiterating that the Congress was committed to fulfilling its promises, he said that the Gandhi family will not care about any adverse consequences while keeping its promises. “Sonia Gandhi promised a separate state for the people of Telangana. We fought for 70 years but it was Sonia Gandhi who delivered Telangana,” he said.
Offering to furnish complete data on the welfare schemes in implementation in Telangana, he said: “I have full details. I can furnish them to journalists or the BJP, or Eknath Shinde family of Ajit Pawar family.” He said that as many as 49 lakh families were getting LPG cylinders for `500 in Telangana, 50 lakh families, free power supply.
The chief minister said that the state government had incurred an expenditure of `3,541 crore for facilitating free travel to women on TGRTC bus services. He added that caste census was going in Telangana which he compared to “a mega health family camp” where Rahul Gandhi’s idea of conducting X-ray is being done to learn what ails which caste.
“We demand the Centre to include caste survey in Census-2025,” Revanth said.