Botsa Blasts Naidu for hunger strike

State Transport Minister Botsa Satyanarayana on Friday found fault with the Telugu Desam Party president N Chandrababu Naidu for starting an indefinite hunger strike and described it as a mere 'farce' with an ulterior motive to capture the farmers' vote bank.

Speaking to media persons at the Secretariat on Friday, the Minister compared Mr Naidu’s efforts as crocodile tears to woo the farmers and capture power. "There is a difference in what he is doing and what we are doing," he said.

Whereas the Congress government was putting in the best foot forward to mitigate the sufferings of the poor tenant farmers, who were reeling under the losses, Mr Naidu undertook the fast only to highlight his actions to be in the good books of the farmers, Mr Satyanarayana stated. “It was a mere show put up by him,” said the minister.

Asked about the former MP from Kadapa, YS Jaganmohan Reddy taking up his whirlwind tour and then start a stir against the government, "today it has become a fashion to go on hunger srike,” said the Minister and added that the suffering farmers were not as innocent as thought to be. Criticising the TDP rule, Mr Satyanarayana pointed out that their rule was restricted to a radius of 10 km in the city. Mr Naidu's rule was a centralised rule saying that it was a one man show, he said.

The Minister made light of his hunger strike saying that Mr Naidu did not think of solutions to various problems faced by the tenant farmers and labourers when he was chief minister but organised surprise checks in the rural areas also, which yielded no results nor did it benefit the farmers in any way. Mr Satyanarayana posed a question as to why Mr Naidu lost in 2009 elections. Answering his own question, he said that it was, ”Mainly because of non-performance.”

In contrast, the Congress was voted back to power because of lapses in Mr Naidu’s government, which the people could not bear, he said. Let Mr Naidu offer constructive criticism instead of slinging mud at the ruling Congress, Mr Satyanarayana said. Asked about the 9-hour uninterrupted free power supply to the farmers as promised by former chief minister late YS Rajasekhara Reddy, the Minister shot back replying that they were implementing it depending on the supply position and there was still three years' time for standing by the Congress manifesto of 2009. "We are determined to implement all the welfare schemes that were started by YSR," he said. “After YSR, the Congress government was seriously attempting to fulfil the poll promises.”