Jagan In Quid Pro Quo Arrangement With Voters: Undavalli

Former MP and public speaker Undavalli Arun Kumar said that Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy was doing a different type of gambling, the result of which cannot be predicted.

He said that Jagan was an astute businessman who is now into a quid pro quo arrangement with the voters. He is giving them money on a daily basis and hoping that they would remain his vote bank for the next elections.

He is behaving like a Robinhood, looting the rich and feeding the poor. In the future, he might even ask the beneficiaries if he should cut down their benefits and increase the HRA for the state employees or if he should reduce the funds being given to them and invest it in power generation.

However, he said that Jagan was failing in one aspect. Money is being sucked out of circulation in the name of disbursement which will have a very bad effect in the long term, he said. Jagan is implementing DBT schemes but pulling out money from the system which is not at all good, he pointed out.

It is being said that Sri Lanka is facing its worst economic crisis ever but it is not true. The country is in a better position compared to India. The value of Indian rupee is 24 times more than Sri Lankan rupee. Things are cheap in that country when compared to that in India, he said.

Middle class management

Despite such heavy prices and other troubles, the Indian middle class can manage the show deftly only because they have very good financial planning. In no other country does the public support the government effectively than in India, he said.

Jagan is doing a very big gambling. Inquiry is on into diversion of funds and even if he is questioned, he has an answer ready that he had spent the money on the poor. However, the voting choice of the poor cannot be predicted. Chandrababu Naidu gave Rs 10,000 to each woman just before 10 days of polling but the voters voted for Jagan, he reminded.

There are 1.47 crore ration cards in the state and each card has four people linked to it which means as many as 5 crore people are below the poverty line, while the total population of the state is 6 crore. Money is simply being distributed without any vision, he lamented.

Lack of vision

The state has no proper roads nor power supply. During division, AP was having surplus power but now, Telangana is in a better position. This situation occurred only due to lack of proper vision, Arun Kumar said.

Every day, Jagan is pressing a key and disbursing money. It is estimated that he had given at least Rs 1 lakh each to as many as 40 lakh families in the last three years. Last time, Jagan secured 1.56 crore votes and he could be calculating it that if two persons in the 40 lakh families vote, he would secure 80 lakh votes easily.

Politics is best business in the nation and that is the reason why politician’s sons or daughters become politicians. Politics has become self-centred and no political party has any intention to improve the situation, he pointed out.

Modi & Capitalism

At the same time, he also fumed at Prime Minsiter Narendra Modi for ignoring the ‘socialist republic’ phrase in the Indian Constitution and blatantly telling that ‘the government has no business to do business’. Modi is taking the country towards capitalism, he said.

On the ‘one nation-one vote’ being proposed by the BJP at the Centre, Arun Kumar said that it was not possible practically. All elections cannot be held at one go because after the polls, there might be fractured verdict in some states or a no-confidence moved in the other which would necessitate some remedial action.

Polavaram promise

Undavalli expressed concern on Polavaram yet again. He fumed at the YCP government for taking over the responsibility of Polavaram project from the TDP government. It is a national project and it is the duty of the Centre to build it and then hand over the same to the respective state. The height of the Polavaram coffer dam would be restricted to 41.5 metres and the BJP has no interest in doing good to AP because it will not gain anything from it. Modi and Shah are Gujarati businessmen and they have many more calculations than Jagan. So the Centre will not build the reservoir for Polavaram as it will cost more. The reservoir will lead to submergence which means the rehabilitation package will have to be implemented. The cost would then escalate to Rs 32,000 crore. The Centre will not spend more and to reduce the expenses, the height of the the dam would be reduced, he pointed out.

Unfortunately, no YCP MP has the guts to raise the issue of implementing the AP Reorganisation Act in toto in the Parliament and we are bearing with it, he added.

Arun Kumar lamented that none of the politicians is concerned over the pathetic state in which Andhra Pradesh is getting crushed. Jagan Reddy took up padayatra with the sole cause of special category status which he has ignored after coming to power and Polavaram project is also a big failure, he said.

Undavalli had reminded Jagan about his rights and legal options with regard to Polavaram in the past but there has been no action from the YCP government.