Hyderabad: Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) Working President K.T. Rama Rao Sunday lashed out at the Centre for ignoring Telangana’s request for funds for flood relief while being partial towards the states ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) by immediately releasing funds after natural calamities.
Rama Rao told a news conference that Prime Minister Narendra Modi turned a deaf ear to the requests from Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao to provide immediate financial support towards relief and rehabilitation measures in flood-hit areas of Hyderabad.
“The Prime Minister sanctioned Rs 669 crore within four days to Karnataka following floods in that state. He personally visited flood-hit areas of Gujarat in 2017 and released Rs 500 crore. It has been about 25 days since Chief Minister Chandrasekhar Rao wrote a letter to the Prime Minister seeking release of Rs 1,350 crore as immediate relief but we still haven’t received a response,” he said.
“Our Prime Minister responds to letters written by Karnataka and Gujarat Chief Ministers but not to letters written by the Telangana Chief Minister. Is Telangana not a part of India? Does the Prime Minister not have the responsibility to help Hyderabad city and its people,” he asked.
KTR, as Rama Rao is popularly known, also slammed BJP’s state leaders for making tall claims while doing nothing to help the state get assistance from the Centre for relief and rehabilitation in flood-affected areas.
He had a dig at Union Minister of State for Home, G. Kishan Reddy saying he was not of any assistance to the state.
“The BJP leaders should introspect and get assistance from the Centre as a responsible party instead of making silly claims,” said KTR, who is son of Chief Minister Chandrasekhar Rao.
“What have Telangana BJP leaders done for Hyderabad? One Minister of State and four MPs failed to fetch even a penny for the city. BJP has not got a penny for Hyderabad, but they came up with ‘Mana Nagaram, Mana BJP (our city, our BJP)’ slogan recently. It’s a shame,” he added.
KTR, who is the Industry, Information Technology, Municipal Administration and Urban Development Minister, hit out at both BJP and Congress for levelling “baseless allegations” over distribution of financial assistance among flood victims by the state government.
“While we were on the ground, reaching out to the people and providing relief measures in the rain-affected areas in Hyderabad, BJP and Congress were busy campaigning in Dubbak. They were doing politics during the crisis,” he said.
KTR stated that even before rains subsided, the Chief Minister announced Rs 550 crore for flood relief measures. “If needed, we will request the CM to sanction Rs 100 crore more for people of Hyderabad,” he added.
According to him, financial assistance of Rs 10,000 was given to 4,30,000 people who were affected by the heavy rains.
The TRS leader stated that the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) has a list of beneficiaries who have received the financial assistance of Rs 10,000 along with their photo and signature.
“It’s sad to see some BJP leaders protest even though they themselves have already received the financial assistance,” he added.
He said a total of 920 teams were set up to provide the ex gratia amount. “While a few brought to our notice that a few families did not receive the ex gratia money, we have again started to reach out to them.”
The minister said the government set up a Disaster Response Force with 800 members headed by an IPS officer to combat such flood situations. He claimed that no other metro in the country has a disaster response force.
KTR termed the floods as a man-made disaster and blamed the previous governments in erstwhile Andhra Pradesh for ignoring the encroachment of tanks and ‘nalas’ as well as unauthorised constructions.
IANS