Rao accuses of BJP of ruling through backdoor means, says it will fall in \'24 polls

Hyderabad: Stepping up the attack on the BJP after announcing plans to set up a national party, Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao said that the BJP is ruling the country with just a 36 per cent vote share and that a non-BJP government will come to power in the Centre in 2024, when the next Lok Sabha polls are scheduled.

He also stated that the state government will pursue legal action against the Centre for lowering the FRBM borrowing limits.

Further, he also offered to resign “in a second” if his claims that the Andhra Pradesh government owes Rs 17,000 crore dues to TS are true.

Speaking in the Legislative Assembly on Monday, Rao said that “even God can’t save the BJP government in 2024 polls”.

Expanding on his national ambitions, Rao promised to implement Telangana's flagship welfares schemes of Rythu Bandhu, Rythu Bima, Dalit Bandhu, 24x7 free power to agriculture, and development programmes, such as Mission Bhagiratha, Mission Kakatiya and lift irrigation projects, to the entire nation in 2024.

Rao also discussed his plans of floating a national party for the first time in the Assembly. "Some people are ridiculing my efforts to launch a national party. Is there any rule that only they should (referring to BJP) run a national party? Can't we launch a national party?" the CM questioned.

Stating that the BJP came to power only in eight states with a full majority, Rao alleged the saffron party of using backdoor means such as purchasing MLAs and toppling democratically-elected governments in all large states, except for Uttar Pradesh.

He said that in 10 states, the BJP is sharing power with regional parties, while it has a strength of fewer than 10 MLAs in 10 others, with none in two states.

"We will send BJP government home in 2024 Lok Sabha polls for adopting anti-people, anti-farmer, anti-labour policies and for failing on all fronts. The BJP government is left with a tenure of fewer than 20 months. A non-BJP government will come to power in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls," Rao said.

He dared the BJP government at the Centre to ban all other political parties and see what happens.

Accusing the Central government of weakening the federal spirit and usurping all of the powers of states (PFC), the Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar stated that the state government will pursue legal action against the Centre for lowering FRBM borrowing limits and for stopping loans for power and irrigation projects in the state from Rural Electrification Corporation (REC) and Power Finance Corporation.

In response to a brief discussion on the 'Central Electricity Bill — Ramification' in the Assembly on Monday, the CM stated that he would step down if his claim that the Centre underutilised its installed power capacity of 4,04 lakh MW was found to be untrue. Rao came down heavily on Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP-led government at the Centre, accusing it of creating hurdles in Telangana's path to successfully implementing 24x7 power supply to all sectors while the Centre and all other States failed to do so due to their inefficiency and poor power policies in all other States.

Rao slammed Modi for selling the assets of several public sector units (PSUs) and has now set its eyes on agriculture and power sectors to handover them to their corporate friends by burdening farmers with higher input costs and power consumers with higher bills. Appealing to the Prime Minister to withdraw power reforms, including the Electricity (Amendments) Bill 2022, which are detrimental to farmers, poor and middle-class, Rao warned that if the Centre fails to withdraw, it would face revolt from the people.

Dubbing Modi as the "master of withdrawing bills and Acts", Rao said, "Earlier, Modi has withdrawn amendments made to Land Acquisition Act following backlash from farmers. Recently, he withdrew three black farm laws owing to intense protests from farmers and even apologised to farmers. In the same way, he should withdraw power reforms which mandate not only installation of meters to agriculture pump sets but also pre-paid smart meters for all types of consumers. People from poorer sections, SCs, STs, BC, and minorities cannot bear higher power bills as these reforms will eventually lead to privatisation of power sector and Discoms."

"The national installed power capacity is 4.04 lakh MW, with a base load (firm power) of 2.42 lakh MW. However, the country recorded highest peak load of 2.1 lakh MW on June 22 this year. This is less than our base load. Apart from optimum utilisation of the base load, we can immediately use at least 1.65 lakh MW in addition," he explained.

Pointing out that both the NDA and the TRS governments were formed at the same time eight years ago at Centre and state, the CM said Telangana's per capita power consumption has increased from 970 units in 2014 to 2,126 units in 2022. However, the national per capita power consumption has increased from 957 units in 2014 to just 1,255 units, which includes Telangana's consumption in 2022.

Lashing out at the Centre for failing to utilise even garbage to produce power, he said, "India produces crores of tonnes of garbage every day. We could have generated power even using garbage. We have such an inefficient government at the Centre which can't utilise even garbage to produce power while Telangana government has already begun power production using garbage under GHMC limits and few other municipalities."

Rao stated that if power reforms were implemented, it would adversely impact about 98 lakh families in Telangana alone. "For that reason, I strongly opposed power reforms. The centre offered to raise FRBM borrowing limit by 5% each for five years to the state, if power reforms are implemented. It amounts to Rs 5,000 crore additional loans per year. I clearly said no keeping in view the interests of people even though it resulted in Rs 25,000 crore loans loss to our state."

Stating that the Centre was trying to pressurise the Telangana government to implement power reforms by stopping loans from REC and RFC to Yadadri power plant, he said, "They changed loan agreement conditions. We entered into a bilateral agreement between state government and PFC, REC. The centre wants us to enter into tripartite agreement by including Centre with an intention to obstruct loans to Telangana, Rao alleged. He charged the Centre of bringing laws under the guise of reforms to loot the people and benefit their crony capitalist friends. "The Centre is trying to hand over the crores of rupees of assets owned by the power companies to the corporate companies," he said. He cautioned 20 lakh employees working in the power sector across the country to fight against power reforms. If not, they are bound to lose their jobs soon, he warned.