Congress slams sale of Andhra Pradesh government lands

Vijayawada: Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) strongly criticised Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy for following the triple-rule policy of selling government land, raising huge loans and levying taxes on people.

Dr Narreddy Tulasi Reddy, working president of APCC, said in a statement here on Wednesday that it was not a progressive decision to sell government property to implement Navaratnalu and Naadu-Nedu programmes. "This will result in scarcity of lands in future for constructing government offices and other needs and then government would be compelled to purchase private land spending huge amount," he said.

Ridiculing the name of Build AP which is in fact Sold AP, Tulasi Reddy said that the Jagan administration has been habituated to raise loans more than its capacity to repay. He recalled that since 1956 to 2014, for the last 58 years right from Neelam Sanjiva Reddy to Kiran Kumar Reddy, the loans raised were Rs 1 lakh crore. From 2014 to 2019, N Chandrababu Naidu raised loans worth Rs 1.5 lakh crore whereas the Jagan administration raised loans worth Rs 91,270 crore in the first year alone.

He said that as per the FRBM, the percentage of loans should not cross 25 per cent of the State's GDP but in AP it was 34.6 per cent which is the highest in the country. Moreover, the state government secured overdraft for seven months in 2019-20 fiscal year.

Tulasi Reddy blasted the state government for burdening people by hiking prices from time to time. The prices of liquor, sand, cement, RTC fares, power tariff and petrol and diesel have gone up exorbitantly during the last 14 months. In addition, the government is poised to raise registration value of the land in August, he deplored.

The APCC working president said that the people elected the YSRCP government hoping that it would fight with the Centre to secure Special Category Status to the state, special packages to Rayalaseema and north Andhra on the lines of Bundelkhand and even obtain Rs 5 lakh crore dues from the Centre. But sadly, the government is busy selling government property, raising loans and imposing more taxes on people, he said.