HYDERABAD: Backing Home Minister Amit Shah’s remarks on Telangana’s caste survey, state BJP president N Ramchander Rao launched a scathing attack on the ruling Congress, calling the exercise a mere political stunt.
Questioning the Congress’s sincerity towards the upliftment of backward communities, he asked, “Why didn’t it conduct a nationwide caste census during its 56 years in power?”
He said that the Congress-led UPA government had carried out a nationwide survey in 2011, spending over Rs 4,000 crore public funds, yet failed to release the findings.
“Even after such massive expenditure, the report was never published. What were they hiding?” he asked. Citing a similar case in Karnataka, Ramchander Rao noted that the Siddaramaiah-led government in 2015 spent over Rs 150 crore on a caste survey, the results of which also remain unpublished. “Now, in Karnataka, the Congress is promising another survey. This pattern only shows their repeated betrayal of backward communities,” he added.
He described the caste survey conducted by the Revanth Reddy government as “unscientific and flawed”.
Questioning the chief minister’s intent, the BJP state president asked, “If Revanth Reddy is genuinely concerned about the backward classes, why didn’t his government follow due procedure during enumeration and while preparing the report?”
He also questioned the Congress government’s failure to publish the data collected during the caste survey and give public access to the report. He accused the government of attempting to shift the blame to the BJP for the delay in the BC reservation bill.