KALABURAGI: Within a few hours of the tweet by KPCC Communication Wing head and Chittapura MLA Priyank Kharge, addressing the Chief Minister, said, “I was disappointed that not a single statement from you (chief minister) or anybody in the government on the claim of K Chandrashekhar Rao that people of Raichur want to merge with Telangana because of welfare schemes,” Raichur district in-charge minister Shankar Patil Munenkoppa has refuted KCR claims.
Munenkoppa said over phone that he wanted to know who from Raichur had told Telangana Chief Minister about merging with Telangana. The Centre has selected Raichur and Yadgir districts as “aspiration districts” and implementation of schemes in these districts are being done speedily. Perhaps due to the welfare of Raichur district, KCR might have eyed it, he said, adding that it is unfair on the CM’s part to trigger confusion. The chief minister will also issue a statement in this regard, he added.
Raichur BJP MLA Shivaraj Patil, who stirred the controversy in October last year, did a volte-face on Thursday. He told TNIE over phone that no one in Raichur wants to merge with Telangana. “We will not give an inch of our land to Telangana,” he said. When he was reminded of his statement, Patil said that it was a pressure tactic to get development schemes to Raichur.
Patil said a Congress leader of Raichur is Congress party observer in Telangana, and he might have stirred politics over his statement. On the status of implementation of welfare schemes in Raichur, Kharge said that the government is not implementing welfare schemes in Raichur, and that the Kalyana Karnataka Region is being neglected.