Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy greeting Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan at the State Legislative Assembly in Hyderabad on Thursday. Photo: Special Arrangement
Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy linked the absence of Leader of the Opposition K. Chandrashekhar Rao in the Assembly for the Governor’s address on Thursday to his commitment to Telangana’s interests and said people are not taking him seriously.
That is why the Bharat Rashtra Samiti (BRS) could win just four seats in the three districts – Mahabubnagar, Nalgonda and Khammam covered by the Krishna basin, he said wondering whether Mr. Rao would attend the Assembly at all to listen to the damage he had done to Telangana in the Krishna basin.
“I want him to attend the Assembly as the Opposition Leader and debate. We will show him all the evidence on how he had compromised on Telangana’s water interests and damaged its future,” he said in an informal chat with reporters.
“Hope he attends the session. Mr. Rao also skipped the Business Advisory Committee (BAC) meeting,” he said.
Recalling the AP government’s forceful entry onto the Nagarjunasagar project with their police on the polling day last year, he questioned the silence of Mr. Rao. Nagarjunasagar is the only project that lies in Telangana while Srisailam’s main operation falls in Andhra Pradesh. “Yet Mr. Rao could not prevent the AP police occupying the dam gates in Telangana,” he said.
Mr. Reddy termed the BRS party’s planned public meeting on the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) as a drama to divert people’s attention from the Kaleshwaram fiasco and the vigilance reports that revealed the poor quality of construction leading to pillars sinking and absolute negligence and lack of accountability.
The Chief Minister said the Chief Justice of the High Court has expressed his inability to spare a sitting Judge for the judicial enquiry into the Kaleshwaram project. “We will discuss in the Cabinet on how to move forward on this,” he said making his intentions clear that the government is committed to expose the ‘negligence and corruption’ in the project execution.
‘How can Harish come?’
The Chief Minister said the BRS provided the names of Mr. K. Chandrasekhar Rao and Kadiyam Srihari for the BAC – and how can Harish Rao walk into the meeting. “It is the prerogative of the Speaker and he might have refused to entertain as there is a violation,” he said.
