T-fire forces YSR into another twist

Hyderabad, April 17: Bowing to sharp criticism from within the party and outside, the Chief Minister, Dr Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy, on Friday beat a hasty retreat on his controversial remarks suggesting that the Rayalaseema area would not get water if Telangana state was formed, and that people of the area would be treated as foreigners in Hyderabad.

The Chief Minister said he was only repeating the threats made by the TRS chief, Mr K. Chandrase-khar Rao, to close institutions belonging to people from Andhra. He said he had neither deviated from the party’s stand on Telangana nor intended to whip up regional passions.

Party leaders thought he was acting as a mere Rayalaseema representative, and that his remarks betrayed a sense of uncertainty over the outcome of Friday’s first phase polling.

Dr Reddy came under the Election Commission scanner with the Telugu Desam, Left parties and the BJP petitioning against him for violation of the moral code of conduct.

The chief electoral officer, Dr I.V. Subba Rao, who obtained a video tape of the Chief Minister’s speech from the Kurnool district collector, said he would verify the contents and take action.

Countering the Chief Minister without undue histrionics, the TD chief, Mr N. Chandrababu Naidu, said his government would complete the Indirasagar (Polavaram) project — which Dr Reddy said the Mahakutami government would not do — and rename it after freedom fighter Alluri Sitarama Raju.

In a strategic move, the TRS was kept out of the delegation, and TRS leaders were told to maintain restraint in reacting to Dr Reddy’s remarks. The TRS senior leader, Mr T. Harish Rao, therefore announced that investors from other regions would be a given red carpet welcome. The CM’s allegation that people from Rayalaseema should live as foreigners in Hyderabad appeared to have done more damage to the Congress than helping it. “The CM should have been subtle while projecting that the TRS would halt projects if the alliance is voted to power,” a senior Congress minister and Dr Reddy loyalist said.

Dr Reddy’s loyalists who are to face the electorate in the second phase of polling on April 23 were also upset. They felt the remarks had strengthened the claims of the Grand Alliance that the Congress had fared badly in the first phase.

“We will lose the edge in constituencies which are witnessing a keen contest,” said a minister from Rayalaseema.

Sources close to the Chief Minister said it was a strategy to divert attention from the TD’s Cash Transfer Scheme.

“The CM had said that the TRS and the CPI(M) would halt the Polavaram project during his meetings in Rajahmundry, much before the first phase polls,” said the CWC member, Mr Vundavalli Aruna Kumar, the Rajahmundry Congress candidate.