BRS alleges bias against Telangana

Hyderabad: The BRS has alleged discrimination against Telangana by the Central government even in the allocation of cold storage facilities.

Party MP Nama Nageswara Rao on Thursday alleged that the information given in a written reply in Parliament and statistics provided clearly indicate the fact that during the last five years Telangana got only Rs 53.33 crore as against Gujarat state which was given Rs 364.67 crore.

Rao criticized the Central government for showing extreme discrimination towards Telangana in the construction and management of cold storage facilities. The BRS MP sought to know from the government on how many cold storage units were there in the country? What was their capacity and details of the new proposals.

The BRS MP said there was discrimination against Telangana in the release of funds for the year 2019-20. He said the Centre did not release any money under the Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture (MIDH) scheme for cold storages in Telangana during the financial year 2021-22.

He said Rs 364.67 crore has been allocated to Gujarat in the last five years while Telangana got only Rs 53.33 crore in five years. He said that in 2021-22, Rs 709.67 crore was released for cold storage facilities in the country, but no allocation was made to Telangana during the period.

In 2019-20, Rs 1,105.79 crore was released for warehouses in the country and again Telangana was ignored. He further said that the Centre was not even giving information about new proposals for the construction of cold storages. He felt that the state needs new cold storages as the area under cultivation and production of crops was increasing. This year alone about 1.65 crore acres have been cultivated. Paddy was cultivated in 68 lakh acres. He asked the Central government to recognise the problems of paddy farmers and construct new cold storage facilities and support the farmers.

Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar said that there were 8,398 cold storages with a capacity of 382.24 lakh metric tonnes across the country, including Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. He said that under the Central scheme, financial assistance will be provided for various horticultural activities along with the establishment of cold storage facilities.