Hyderabad: In a strong warning to politicians making provocative statements during the ongoing campaigning for the December 1 GHMC elections, IT Minister KT Rama Rao on Saturday said the government would not be soft on anyone who tries to disturb peace and communal harmony in the city.
“We will not let anyone disturb the peace in Hyderabad. We will certainly not be soft in any way. In fact, not only MIM and BJP leaders, even if TRS leaders make some statements and try to disturb the peace, cases will be registered against them,” Rao said while addressing business personalities from different communities including Agarwal, Maheshwari, Marwari and Gujarati at a Vibrant Hyderabad programme in the city.
If Hyderabad was disturbed once, Telangana would be disturbed, affecting investments and businesses that come to the State, he said.
Recalling Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s reference in Bihar to double-engine governance with the same parties ruling at the Centre and in the State, Rao said: “I am also saying the same thing. The State and GHMC should be ruled by the same party.”
Continuing the attack on the BJP’s attempt to divert public attention from developmental issues to communal ones, Rao said instead of speaking about local issues, they were talking about Bin Laden and Babar who were in no way connected to the elections. In the last six years, Telangana’s share of taxes to the Central government was Rs.2.72 lakh crore and in return, the Centre had given only Rs.1.40 lakh crore through devolution of taxes.
“But Amit Shah says we have given you Rs 1 lakh crore. I’m asking him, who has given whom. This attitude is not good,” he said.
On the NDA government’s Rs 20 lakh crore Covid-19 relief package too, Rao pointed out that the BJP was bluffing, with no one nowhere benefitting from the package.
Stating that industrialists used to stage protests demanding power supply in the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh, Rao said the formation of Telangana had changed the situation, with power now being supplied to industrialists, farmers and domestic users too round-the-clock.
“Former AP Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy tried to scare us saying Telangana would be dark as there were no power plants. In those days, Telangana had an installed capacity of 7,000 MW, and now, it is 16,000 MW. Power consumption is a direct indicator of development and the highest per capita consumption of power in the country is currently in Telangana,” he said.
To ensure vulnerable sections of society are taken care of, he said Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao had focused on welfare-oriented schemes and initiatives, ranging from Aasara pensions, KCR Kits for institutional deliveries, Kalyana Lakshmi, Shaadi Mubarak, Annapurna centres, Basthi Dawakhanas etc., besides enhancement of wages of sanitation workers.
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