Adilabad, Karimnagar: Claiming that the Congress had 'patented' free power to agriculture, TPCC president A. Revanth Reddy said that the Congress would provide 24-hour quality free power to the sector, if it is voted to power in Telangana.
He made it clear that the Congress had no plan to restrict the facility and appealed to farmers not to believe the 'lies' being spread by BRS leaders. He was speaking at public meetings in Bellampalli, Ramagundam and Dharmapuri on Saturday as part of his campaign for the Assembly polls.
"It's the Congress which introduced free power to agriculture scheme in 2004. The first file signed by then Chief Minister, the late Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy in 2004 was to extend free power to agriculture. Initially, it was seven hours of free power and it was increased to nine hours after the 2009 Assembly elections.”
“For that reason, I say Congress has patented free power to agriculture. No other party has right to point fingers at Congress over free power to farmers," Revanth Reddy said.
He said that the CM cultivated fine rice in 200 acres in his farmhouse and earned Rs 1.8 crore but had asked farmers not to sow paddy. The CM sold the paddy he produced for Rs 4,250 per quintal, but the BRS government did not purchase the paddy produced by the farmers by paying them at least Rs 2,000. They were forced them to sell their produce for a cheap rate, he alleged.
"KCR is making false propaganda that Rythu Bandhu funds will not reach the farmers if the Dharani portal is removed. He should answer how he disbursed the funds from 2018 to 2020 when there was no portal," as an assurance to farmers.
Revanth Reddy slammed the Chief Minister for wasting Rs 1.51 lakh crore on the construction of the Kaleshwaram project which had proved not to be worthy with the Medigadda barrage’s four pillars sinking and Annaram barrage developing cracks.
On other issues, he asked that if Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao was confident of victory, why did he go to the court and get the election to the Singareni mine workers unions stopped.
The Singareni Collieries survived because of the initiative taken by late Congress leader'Kaka' G. Venkataswamy, he said.
He appealed to the people to choose whether they want Rs 10 lakh income through different welfare schemes to be implemented by the Congress, if elected, or a one-time bribe of Rs 5,000. Revanth Reddy asked the people to say ‘Bye.. Bye KCR’ before concluding his speech.
Turning to local issues, he alleged that by indulging in sand, coal and even ash mafia, BRS MLA K. Chander Patel had “turned into a bandit, looted public money and was paying tax to the Kalvakuntla family.”
Revanth Reddy alleged that even though the people had given clear verdict by electing Adluri Laxman as MLA, the BRS had indulged in irregularities in counting of votes due to which BRS candidate Koppula Eshwar was declared elected in 2018.
Revanth Reddy alleged that BRS Chennur MLA Balka Suman had encroached upon Singareni land and government land in Hyderabad and took commissions to provide jobs. He questioned Suman's assets.
He also alleged that Bellampalli BRS candidate Durgam Chinnaiah encroached on government lands and sexually harassed women but CM supported him without taking action against him.
