Vote for Congress to Reap Benefits of Telangana Statehood, Says Kharge

HYDERABAD: AICC president Mallikarjun Kharge on Friday said that Congress leader Sonia Gandhi accorded statehood to Telangana with a belief that people will be benefited but sadly it was Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao and his family members who derived benefit out of it in the last nine and a half years. 

Kharge appealed to the people of Telangana to elect the Congress government if they want to reap benefits from Telangana state formation and to get power to rule themselves.

Addressing a public meeting in LB Nagar on Friday, Kharge alleged that Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao did not allow people to meet him to air their grievances or allow elected MLAs to meet him to take the issues concerning people to his notice in the last nine years.

"Chandrashekhar Rao neither worked in the Secretariat or Legislative Assembly in the last nine years. He confined himself to his farmhouse. He ran the government from his farmhouse. But he always remained accessible to the land, sand and mining mafia. He and his family members looted Telangana," Kharge said.

Claiming that the rich have become richer and the poor have become poorer under the BRS regime, Kharge said, “The Congress gave Telangana as a revenue-surplus state. It was a prosperous state. Chandrashekhar Rao and his family members looted the state due to which it turned into a debt-ridden state. They grabbed the lands of the poor that were distributed by previous Congress governments."

Stating that Telangana state was in the wrong hands in the last nine years, Kharge appealed to voters to dethrone the BRS government which failed to ensure people got due share in funds, water and jobs, for which they fought for statehood for over six decades.

Kharge slammed the Chief Minister for criticising former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and "Indiramma Rajyam", which the Congress has promised to bring in Telangana if voted to power.

"KCR says Indiramma Rajyam means poverty and hunger. But it was Indira Gandhi, who made the country self-reliant in food production and eradicated hunger and poverty. She won from both Rae Bareli and Medak Lok Sabha seats at a time in the 1980s. But she retained Medak with an aim to develop Telangana. That's her commitment for the development of Telangana," Kharge added.