Municipal Administration and Urban Development Minister KT Rama Rao stated that the BJP-led Centre was acting with vengeance towards Telangana, in addition to treating the State as an enemy country, and that the Centre had yet to clear MGNREGS dues worth Rs.1,200 crore.
On the contrary, he stated that the State government would release Rs.1,300 crore by the end of this month to clear dues pertaining to Palle Pragathi, Constituency Development Programmes and other grants, he said.
These funds would be used to clear arrears of up to Rs.1 crore each due to panchayats and rural bodies under different grants. The total of Rs.1,300 crore to be released this month end would help clear nearly three months of arrears, he said.
Speaking at the National Panchayat Awards distribution program here on Monday, the Minister said that if the Union government had invested as much effort in rural empowerment as the State government had, there would have been room to work with double enthusiasm.
Unfortunately, the Centre was acting with vengeance towards Telangana and treating the State like an enemy country. As financial sanctions were imposed on enemy countries to cause unrest, similarly the rightful share of Rs.1,200 crore under MGNREGS payable to Telangana was being deliberately held back by the Centre, he said.
“I request Sarpanches and other elected public representatives to discuss the Centre’s discrimination and political vendetta against Telangana in villages,” he said, adding that at a time when the Telangana government was implementing the Palle Pragathi program for rural empowerment, the Centre was holding back funds to harass the State government.
If people had any apprehensions about these charges, they could file Right to Information applications to obtain more information, he said.
In addition to Gram Panchayats that won national Panchayat Raj awards, the Minister stated that Rajanna Sircilla had twice won the Best Zilla Parishad award at the national level.
Furthermore, Rajanna Sircilla bagged the Best District award in the four star category thrice under the Swachh Survekshan rankings. This was possible due to the united efforts put in by the district administration and elected public representatives, he said.
In the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh, Gangadevipally and Ankapur were identified as role model villages. He stated that under the BRS government, all 12,769 Gram Panchayats were competing with one another to ensure sanitation, greenery, rural development, and the provision of amenities.
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With the effective implementation of Palle Pragathi program, all the gram panchayats should serve as index for rural development in the country.
In 2014, a team from Telangana visited Kerala to study best practices in gram panchayats. Now, teams from 11 to 12 States were visiting Telangana to study best practices.
Further, Telangana’s administrative policies and governance were being taught to trainee officers at Lal Bahadur Shastry Academy, Mussoorie, as part of the course curriculum, he said, adding that this was a matter of pride for Telangana.
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