Date:13/03/2004 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2004/03/13/stories/2004031302530500.htm

Andhra Pradesh

True colours of NDA Government are exposed, says YSR

By Our Staff Reporter

HYDERABAD, MARCH 12. The former Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader, Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy, has said that the true colours of the BJP-led NDA Government were truly exposed in the Union Minister of State for Urban Development, B. Dattatreya's remarks about death of farmers "due to indigestion".

Dr. Reddy stated in a press release that the remarks of Mr. Dattatreya were no slip of the tongue but a deliberate voice of the Central Government showing its anti-poor behaviour and policies.

By owning up that there were no suicides by farmers, Mr. Dattatreya had more or less toed the line of Chief Minister, N. Chandrababu Naidu, that the farmers committed suicide lured by the Rs. 1 lakh ex-gratia, he said. Mr. Naidu had never admitted that the farmers' suicide was due to poverty and insisted that they were mainly on account of psychological problems.