Govt launches Rs 1 cr insurance for Singareni miners

Hyderabad: The State Government on Monday announced the launch of Rs 1 crore insurance for Singareni coal workers.

Addressing the media after entering into an MoU with Union Bank of India, Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy said that Singareni workers had played a key role in the agitation for separate Telangana. But after the state was formed, they were ignored by the previous government. “Instead of stalling efforts of the Centre to privatise the coal mines, the then government had cooperated with the Centre,” he said.

The Congress government was trying to clear the mess one after the other which they had inherited from the past government.

The magnitude of damage caused to the state during the 10-year rule of KCR had caused immense damage to the state which was equivalent to 100 years, he said.

The Government was ready to hold a special session of the Assembly for a debate on the promises made and implemented by the three parties Congress, BRS and BJP. While the Centre did not help the state, BRS ruined it, he said.

The CM said the government had fulfilled two guarantees soon after coming to power and two would be implemented on Tuesday. “That is our track record in just 70 days while the BRS government failed to implement the promises they had made,” he said.

The Chief Minister said the debt servicing was only Rs 6,000 crore per annum before the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh. But in the last ten years the debt burden increased to Rs 7 lakh crore and the annual debt repayment was a whopping Rs 70,000 crore.

Taking a jibe at KCR, he said the former CM claims that he had read 80,000 books. Was it for pushing the state into debt trap, he asked. KCR had earned a distinction of being the only CM who destroyed the state economy in a short time. Even now, neither BRS nor BJP was coming forward with suggestions when sought on the floor of the Assembly, CM said.

The Congress-led state government was approaching the Centre to resolve the state issues amicably but the response from Union Minister Kishan Reddy was not coming forth. T-BJP and BRS have no right to speak on people’s issues. “Both are speaking the same language and the rhetoric is also the same. Their aim is to malign the newly formed government,” he said.

The Chief Minister took strong exception to the allegations made by T Harish Rao and KT Rama Rao against the government. “Harish is mindless. He claims that the government raised loans to create assets. Mission Bhagiratha and Kaleshwaram projects cannot be called assets as they did not generate any revenue as projected in the DPR and on the other hand they had become liabilities. The BRS government floated corporations to bypass FRBM regulations to raise loans,” he said.

Referring to other issues, the CM said the Congress government had ordered a probe into the corruption related to sheep distribution. Revanth Reddy said perhaps no one can beat KCR’s family in corruption. The Congress government would take advice from subject experts to deliver good governance, he said.

When asked about free power, he said white ration card was mandatory to avail free power up to 200 units and Rs 500 cooking gas cylinder scheme benefits. He requested those who did not possess white cards to approach the mandal offices and get the cards.