HYDERABAD: BRS leader T Harish Rao on Monday criticised the Congress government for its handling of a drought-like situation, power shortages and irrigation crisis in the state. He sought to know why the Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy and his Cabinet colleagues were travelling to Goa and New Delhi when Telangana farmers were facing several problems.
Speaking to reporters here, the former minister demanded that the government explain what steps it had taken over the past nine months to deal with the El Nino impact.
“The government failed to come up with an action plan to deal with the situation even though there have been warnings over the El Nino threat for the past nine months,” he said, questioning the lack of clear decisions and concrete measures to protect farmers and agricultural labourers.
Recalling that the government had sent messages asking farmers to gather at Rythu Vedikas at 11 am for a meeting with the chief minister, he said: “MLAs were also informed that a video conference would take place at noon. However, the meeting was repeatedly cancelled and rescheduled. Later, farmers were told that the deputy chief minister would attend instead.”
“Is this government playing games with farmers? At a time when the state is facing a serious agricultural crisis, it cannot even conduct a meeting properly,” he said.
The Siddipet MLA alleged that agricultural labourers from Palamuru and Jogulamba Gadwal districts were being forced to migrate to Karnataka in search of work. He alleged that farmers were facing problems due to irregular power supply, with many areas receiving only about seven-hour power supply.
He alleged that the government had not entered into power purchase agreements in advance, as a result it was purchasing power at high prices.
Harish asked why the Devadula project pumps were not being operated for longer hours and why the Kannepalli pump house was not being fully utilised. He also objected to the allocation of water to beer and liquor manufacturing units when people were facing shortage of drinking and irrigation water.