Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Chandrababu Naidu promises sops for Rajakas

HYDERABAD: Telugu Desam Party president N. Chandrababu Naidu has come up with another round of sops, this time for Rajakas, the washerpersons community, promising Scheduled Caste status, loans at 10 paisa interest rate, one acre for each family and Rs. 50 crore for their federation.

Addressing members of the community who came from all over the State to participate in “Rajaka Garjana”, here on Monday, Mr. Naidu said he would not be deterred by the way Chief Minister Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy was ridiculing his promises as impractical.

He said he was sure of implementing all the promises, if his party assumed power, as all it required was only a part of the Government resources that were otherwise going into the pockets of a chosen few in the form of corruption. “Dr. Reddy has lot of prime Government land for his son and relatives but no land for you. In contrast I believe in being the trustee of people’s property and will give land to only the poor and the needy”.

His party would be among the first to support the resolution in the Assembly seeking SC status for the Rajaka community (it enjoys BC ‘A’ status now) in the State as it was in vogue in 17 other States. He described as “drama” the State Government’s attempt to seek ST status when they were demanding that of SC. The Rs. 50 crore he was promising for Rajaka cooperative federation was against Rs. 20 lakhs provided by the Congress Government.

He would introduce insurance and housing schemes and study if free power supply was possible for pressing clothes.

Others who spoke include Balaji Shinde of Maharashtra and Rajaka United Front leaders B. Venkateswarlu, G. Chander Rao and J. Satyanarayana.

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