TPCC terms budget disappointing

Hyderabad: Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee on Friday described the budget presented by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman was disappointing and there was nothing to cheer about.

Speaking to the media in Delhi, Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee president N Uttam Kumar Reddy said the hopes nursed by the unemployed, farmers, and the industry were dashed.

He criticised the Centre for failing to come to the rescue of the farmers who have been committing suicide. He said the Congress is opposed to disinvestment of the public sector.

Parliament member A Revanth Reddy said the budget was corporate friendly and contain nothing for the common people. He said that while the Centre was getting huge revenue from the southern States, they were not provided with enough investments.

He said due to the failure of State government no allocations had been made for Telangana State. He said no mention of the IT sector has disappointed the southern States.

Another MP K Venkat Reddy said the budget had ignored the promises being made in the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act. He said the budget was an anti-Telangana one.

He said that the budget meted out injustice to the State due to the failure of Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao. He said the Chief Minister was engaged in praising the Prime Minister for the past five years.

He said that no funds to the AIIMS, Kaleshwaram and Tribal University hade disappointed the State. He alleged that the Chief Minister could not bring pressure on the Prime Minister because of personal reasons.

TPCC Working president Ponnam Prabhakar said there was no clarity in the Union budget. He said though the BJP said that its government would create two crore jobs every year, no steps have been announced in the budget.

Kisan Cell national vice-chairman M Kodanda Reddy said the the Prime Minister Fasal Bima Yojana has helped the private companies and not the farmers.

He said that though Rs 1.25 lakh crore has been collected as premium from the farmers, the insurance paid to them was meagre.

He said that several schemes had been named after the Prime Minister. The budget had failed to create confidence among the youth and farmers.

He said that no steps had been announced to create jobs.

He alleged that the doors had been opened for the foreign investors. No steps had been taken to double the income of the farmers.

The Centre has announced hike of just Rs 65 MSP per quintal for the paddy.