Vijayawada: The debate on the no-confidence motion moved by the Telugu Desam in the Lok Sabha on Friday began on a stormy note. Despite repeated requests from speaker Sumitra Mahajan, Telangana Rashtra Samiti MPs raised slogans and interrupted the speech of Telugu Desam MP Galla Jayadev. Calling Andhra Pradesh’s agitation “Dharma Yudh”, Mr Jayadev in a long and impassioned speech accused the Union government of showing apathy towards Andhra Pradesh.
He also compared the ongoing war between the Union and state governments as a war between “majority” and “morality”. “It is a war between the Modi regime and five crore people of Andhra Pradesh,” he said, and added that it is a war against discrimination shown by the Modi regime towards AP. “It is a war to honour an Act of Parliament and assurances made by Prime Minister in Parliament,” Mr Jayadev observed.
He also said that YSRC MPs are on the guest list of Mr Modi and the Telugu Desam is on the vigilance list. “It is a war between the authoritarian, Machiavellian attitude of the Modi regime and the rights of states that make up the Federal Republic of India,” said an emotional Mr Jayadev in his 56-page speech.
“This no-confidence motion has been brought by the TD for four reasons — fairness, trust, priority and bias. Or rather, lack of fairness, lack of trust, lack of priority and unbiased approach,” Mr Jayadev said. “It has been four years since the Bill was passed and the two new states were formed — one is the old state with a new name, and the other is the new state with the old name,” he said and added that Telangana is not a new state, AP is a new state.
“All challenges and burdens are to be faced by AP. We are the ones who have to build infrastructure, capital, industrial base, while Telangana has all of them. It has been four years since we have been put to that challenge, but the uncertainty and difficulties go back several decades and reached its peak 10 years prior to bifurcation and we continue to struggle even after four years of bifurcation with the same uncertainty.”
Speaking on agriculture, he said that AP has been reduced to an agrarian state. Some 31.77 per cent of its revenue comes from agriculture when compared to 15.34 per cent of Telangana, 11.39 per cent of Tamil Nadu, and 11.68 per cent of Karnataka,” Mr Jayadev said.
