Congress to postpone Telangana issue

Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy was seen defending his stand when presenting his views about Telangana to Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh.

The Congress high command, it seems, had asked YSR to clarify his stand on Telangana because almost all other parties in the State now seem to be supporting the T issue. The high command wanted him to state how he is going to go for elections if he is undecided on Telangana.

YSR stated that feelings of other regions must also be considered first before going ahead. He also mentioned that a States Reorganization Committee may become imminent in the long run. However, for the present he is confident he can delay this issue for some more time. He stated that as of now, there is no hurry for them. The Elections in other parts of the Country in the coming months will not affect the Elections in Andhra Pradesh, was what YSR felt.

It is clear that YSR is still riding on the wave of his policies. The sentiments of people may change if the Congress loses in other states in the coming elections.

Congress and its Indiramma Sambaralu

Congress is now into its third phase of Indiramma Sambaralu. For those who know little about these celebrations, let us tell you, the Congress during its rule has done several pro-poor activities in which one is the Gruha kalpa scheme under which they claim to have constructed lakhs of houses for the poor.

At several of these speeches, YSR has been seen becoming very emotional. He first highlights all the good things, then gives the statistics for everyone to see the facts, and finally he requests the people to compare the development programs of Congress and TDP and see for themselves what difference the Congress is making for them.

While this is on one side, we have had cases of thousands of poor people complaining during these meetings that the real beneficiaries are not getting any houses. We have had an NRI lodging a complaint regarding how a Construction company has cheated him of crores of rupees under these schemes. We have farmer suicides, farmer injustice in sale of cotton and so on.

Lot of things seem to be looking good on paper, but not all that good in reality. It is also true that while some get benefited, some will always remain outside this bracket. And, we haven't even started talking about how Lok Satta, TDP, Praja Rajyam and other parties have challenged Congress to publish white papers on the money spent. They all feel that a lot of public money is being diverted by selfish people before it is reaching the people.

It is has been seen time and again in the last four and half years that the Congress has had a lot of difficultly in being transparent in their Governance. In spite of repeated complaints from Opposition, Congress resorted only to counter-allegations but has never really accepted a challenge and acted more answerably. However, transperancy, answerablity, and performance are now becoming the need of the hour as people are becoming more and more aware. Unless Congress tries become more transparent in AP, it is running the risk of losing faith in people, in spite of its performance.

Congress and TDP are eager to give Awards to each other

Alarmed at the way TDP chief, Chandrababu Naidu was declaring freebies to the public, the Congress declared that he is fit to be given an award called "All Free."

Reacting quickly to the challenge thrown at him, Chandrababu Naidu said he is ready to take the honour from the party but the Congress party must also be ready to take an award for "Most Corrupt" party.

Allegations and counter allegations are common in politics, particularly when the elections are so close.