Andhra Pradesh Congress opposed the very idea of constructing a temporary capital or secretariat in Amaravati capital region. The party asked the CM to stop spending on temporary arrangements instead oncentrate on developing capital city as per schedule. APCC chief N Raghuveera Reddy sees hidden agenda in the construction of makeshift secretariat at a huge cost of Rs 180 crore.
When the government had plans to build a state-of-the-art secretariat in the capital city by 2018, where was the need to spend such a huge amount to construct a temporary accommodation just for two years?, he asked.
“I see a conspiracy behind the construction of temporary secretariat. There is hidden agenda behind it,” he alleged today. Raghuvira’s argument is that ” You (Naidu) had already spent over Rs 100 crore on renovation of various blocks in the State secretariat and your camp office at Hyderabad. Later, money was spent in Vijayawada too for your camp house, camp residence and to create other facilities . Now, you want to have temporary secretariat. Whom are you wanting to benefit, Mr Naidu?,People or government or some builders? ” Raghuvira wants Naidu to spell out real motive in going in on a massive spending spree on offices, when the state needs more money for developmental activities.
He dubbed this as splurging public money on unproductive activities and asked Naidu to stop this forthwith.
He accused Naidu of impropriety on two counts.” On one side you are splurging money on fanciful activities. On the other, you are misleading people about the central assistance to save yourself from cash-for -vote scam. Your are silenced because of your involvement in these dubious activities. You don’t want to fight with the centre because you are under the obligation of not embarrassing Modi by demanding funds as mentioned by UPA government at the time of passage of bifurcation bill, ” Raghuvira said.
According to Raghuveera, as per the Bifurcation Act AP should get about Rs 5 lakh crore worth of Central assistance, but even after 20 months the State had received not even 10 per cent of the promised assistance.
“Though Rs 14,409 crore revenue deficit has to be reimbursed by the Centre to the State, Centre has till now reimbursed only Rs 2,016 crore. Similarly, under backward area development fund the State should receive Rs 24,350 crore but till now the State had received only Rs 700 crore,” the APCC chief pointed out.
