BJP takes combative posture against TDP

Tirupati: In an effort to offset the all-out war launched by Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, the BJP turned combative in the district, the home turf of Naidu. The saffron party which has been sulking in the district after it parted ways with the ruling TDP, began a virulent attack by highlighting the failure of ruling party with regard to the development of the district, particularly, the completion of irrigation projects which were pending for long and also the revival of Chittoor Cooperative Dairy, once a behemoth of dairy industry in the district and was closed during the TDP regime in 2002. 

Despite the tall claims, the ruling party miserably failed in completing the two major irrigation projects Handri-Neeva and Galeru-Nagari, the brain child of late NT Rama Rao, founder of TDP, which the saffron party decided to take up as a major issue to counter TDP which was embarrassing it on Special Category Status (SCS) issue.

It is needless to say that BJP deliberately resolved to make much of on the TDP failures in the home district of CM Naidu in an apparent attempt to embrace him and also get the state-wide attention against Naidu projecting him as the one who failed to keep his assurance given to his own district people. 

It is pertinent to note that the opposition parties including YSR Congress, Congress, Left parties and farmers associations have been accusing the TDP of slow poisoning Chittoor Cooperative Dairy to die so as to benefit Naidu’s family owned Heritage Dairy in the district. BJP activists visited the closed Chittoor dairy on Tuesday and also staged a dharna at the Collectorate protesting the delay in completion of Handri-Neeva and Galeru-Nagari amply revealing that the saffron party will no more remain silent.

In the protest meeting, the leaders including former national council member K Santha Reddy, district president B Chandra Reddy tore Chief Minister apart on his failed assurances and particularly dwelled at length on Chittoor Dairy which once remained a lifeline of the district and pending irrigation projects that are essential for the district in the absence of no rivers.

Speaking to The Hans India, newly appointed BJP state spokesperson Samanchi Srinivas said Chandrababu himself declared in 2015 on several occasion that the district would get Handri-Neeva water by 2016. Two years passed but there is no sign of the district including Kuppam area getting the waters from Handri-Neeva. “Is it not letting down the people of his own district,” he asked.

Further, the closure of Chittoor Cooperative Dairy ultimately left the farmers at the mercy of private dairies in the district getting low price for their milk supplied to the dairies, Srinivas said adding that “we will expose TDP betraying the farmers in the district where the dairy has over taken agriculture and providing livelihood to thousands of small and marginal farmers and also agriculture labourers”.