Demonetisation to impact TRS government fete plan

Hyderabad: Demonetisation is likely to impact the completion of half-term celebrations of the TRS government on December 2.

The party leadership was in favour of holding a huge public meeting in the city to celebrate completion of its half term in office besides holding month-long celebrations to highlight the achievements of the TRS government in various sectors.

However, with the state government’s financial condition turning from bad to worse and with the general public facing several hardships due to the currency crisis, Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao is learnt to be having second thoughts about the celebrations and is likely to cancel or postpone them. This was apparently discussed with a few ministers and officials on Sunday.

“Broadly, it was felt that there is no mood to celebrate among any sections at this stage due to the currency crisis. The atmosphere is not at all suitable to mobilise people for pubic meetings or holding any celebrations in Hyderabad or in districts. People are fed up with the currency crisis by standing in long queues for hours together before banks and ATMs. Going by the reports, there are indications that the situation will not improve at least till December-end. Thus it was felt in the meeting to drop plans to hold public meetings or celebrations for now and wait till December-end, when the situation is expected to improve,” said a TRS source.

The Chief Minister was keen on holding half-term celebrations on a grand scale as the party formed the first government in the new state, and due to the welfare schemes of the government. Also, the sudden rains that lashed the state in September had yielded good inflows due to which all reservoirs and tanks are brimming with water after a long time, resulting in a “feel good factor” in rural areas where brisk agriculture activities are going on, and the TRS leadership felt that all these factors were ideal to celebrate the half-term in office.

However, the sudden announcement by the Centre on demonetisation of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes followed by the introduction of withdrawal norms last week changed the atmosphere. Starting from villages to mandals to district headquarters to the state capital, a sense of unrest prevails among all sections with people running to banks and ATMs for money and there is no clarity when things will come back to normalcy.