Amaravati: TDP accuses govt of fudging per capita income figures

Amaravati: TDP national spokesperson Kommareddy Pattabhi on Sunday accused the YSRCP government of giving wrong data for getting better rankings in the India Today annual survey on the performance of different States in the country in various categories of the economy.

Pattabhi said that the per capita income increased from Rs 82,870 in 2013-14 to Rs 1.64 lakh in 2018-19 during the Chandrababu regime. But the Jagan Reddy government gave wrong feedback to India Today that the per capita income was just Rs 1.51 lakh in 2018-19, saying that it had increased that to Rs 1.69 lakh by 2019-20.

Based on such false figures, the YSRCP government got top place in 'most improved State' ranking for AP in economic growth in order to claim false credit.

Addressing a press conference here, the TDP leader said that while the actual increase in per capita income was just Rs 5,000 during the one-year rule of the YSRCP, it was falsely reported that the increase was over Rs 18,000. Even the white paper released by Finance Minister Buggana Rajendranath Reddy in July 2019, said that per capita income was Rs 1.64 lakh during 2018-19. While the PCI doubled by over Rs 82,000 during the five year regime of Chandrababu Naidu, the increase was just Rs 5,000 in the first one year rule of the YSRCP.

Pattabhi said that India Today gave its rankings based on the last five years' performance of the State. As such, the credit should go to the Chandrababu regime as its performance for over 4 years helped in getting the top rankings. AP got good rankings in the 'most improved State' category because of the TDP regime's achievements. Whereas, the State slipped its place in 'best performing state' rankings because of the retrogressive policies of the YSRCP.

Stating that many international tourism events took place in the TDP regime, Pattabhi said that the Jagan Reddy regime stopped all of them and no marathons or Formula 1 power boat racing or international air shows took place in AP in the past 18 months. Because of this, AP ranking in the best performance State category in tourism went down from 9th place during the TDP regime to 17th place now.

However, AP stood top in 'most improved state' ranking in tourism simply because of the TDP achievements that were considered for four years out of the total five years of overall State performance.

Pattabhi recalled how the TDP regime gave a boost to the Buddhist circuit, adventure tourism and other such events. Efforts were made for attracting Rs 10,000 crore investments in the tourism infrastructure. But now, there was no talk of such developmental initiatives under the YSRCP rule.On the contrary, it was using its own media to boast of top rankings with the help of false figures.