Telangana Chief Minister KCR with the four MLAs said to have been approached by the BJP. (Supplied)
Breaking his silence on the Cash for MLAs case, Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao on Sunday, 30 October, said that BJP emissaries’ attempt had boomeranged on them as the TRS legislators had proved that they cannot be bought, come what may.
Parading the four TRS legislators — Pilot Rohit Reddy, Beeram Harashvardhan Reddy, Guvvala Balaraju, and Rega Kantha Rao — before the people in a public meeting at Bangarigadda near Chandur, the headquarters of Munugode constituency, the chief minister said that the four had turned down offers of ₹100 crore to each as though it was just a pittance.
“By spurning the BJP offer, the legislators have taken Telangana’s pride and self-respect to another plane,” he said as he complimented them profusely.
The chief minister received an electrifying response from the people when he brought up the attempt to purchase MLAs — as though they were waiting to hear about it from him.
Telangana Chief Minister at the Munugode Rally. (Supplied)
The venue, packed choc a bloc, cheered him lustily as he took broadsides at Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP for trying to pull down governments.
The chief minister, giving an inkling of what lay in store for the BJP, said that what has come out in the open is an infinitesimally small fragment of a major conspiracy that the saffron party had hatched.
He dropped enough hints that the TRS would move forward more aggressively to expose the BJP’s undemocratic and unethical methods of functioning, to nail it at the national level.
“I have evidence that would shake the seat of power in Delhi. As the issue is in the court, I am not able to say much because whatever I say might influence the course of the investigation,” he said.
In his 40-minute address, he called the emissaries as “BJP brokers”, adding that they were a part of a larger conspiracy of the saffron party to buy about 20 to 30 MLAs and topple the democratically-elected government in the state.
He wanted to know where the BJP gets the “thousands of crores of rupees” it uses to purchase MLAs.
“This aspect has to be probed and the truth should come out. Everyone wants to know who was behind the attempt to purchase the MLAs,” he said, and pointed out that the Modi government at the Centre has no money to procure paddy from Telangana but thousands of crores of rupees to purchase MLAs.
The chief minister said the Munugode by-election was the beginning of his new movement to end BJP rule at the Centre.
“You are fortunate that the by-election will remain a watershed in the fight against communalism and growing economic disparities, and the unending greed for power.”
Referring to Modi he said: “You have become the prime minister of the country twice. There is no position higher than what you are occupying now. Then why are you resorting to destabilising the governments, fomenting communal unrest?”
He also advised voters to ensure that the verdict in the by-election is like a slap on the face of the BJP. The by-election has been thrust upon us. No one wants it. Now they are trying to confuse you into supporting them. “Don’t be misled. Don’t go astray. Support the TRS,” he said.
Telangana Chief Minister KCR addressed a huge rally at bypoll-bound Munugode and paraded the four MLAs who were sought to be poached by the BJP. (Supplied)
The chief minister reiterated his agenda of taking the nation forward on the road to prosperity. He touched upon the need for ensuring irrigation to all cultivable land in the country. .”I want to replicate the Telangana model of development in the entire nation. That is the reason why TRS has been rebranded as BRS,” he said.
Tearing into the BJP rule at the Centre, the chief minister said that it is solely responsible for the ills that are afflicting the country’s economy and for the plight of the people, particularly the farmers.
He said it was shameful that the value of the rupee should plummet lower than that of Nepal’s and Bangladesh’s currencies. The BJP had made life miserable for the people across the nation by hiking the pries of petrol, diesel, and LPG.
The chief minister pointed out that Modi had placed an unbearable burden on the weavers by imposing a GST of five percent at a time when Telangana was taking up several measures for their welfare. Apart from introducing Cheneta Bima, the budget for the handloom sector had been hiked to ₹200 crore from ₹70 crore, he said.
He lashed out at the Centre’s move to curtail welfare schemes of the states by branding them as freebies.
“Modi is asking our state not to pay Rythu Bandhu, but he was ready to rob the nation to pay ₹14 lakh crore to the corporate sector,” he said.
