Swarna Bharathi trust was founded in 2001 with an idea of giving back to the society and serving the needy by Deepa Venkat, guided by the Union Minister for Parliamentary Affairs, M Venkaiah Naidu. Recently controversies seem to surround the trust.
A contractor named Paladugu Satyanarayana alleged that the trust is not paying his bills since two and half years, even after he completed construction of building for the trust. He claimed that he laid a road for the trust at first and got paid rupees 30 lakhs. Later he was awarded the responsibility to construct a building at a cost of rupees 21 lakhs. He accused that, after completion the figures were manipulated and the expenditure was shown as 17.60 lakh which is also unpaid. When he tried to pressurise, the trust asked him to consider it as donation to the trust. He said he is a small farmer cannot afford to do so and also held that if needed he would go on strike.
On another note, CPI state secretary K Ramakrishna has demanded an inquiry alleging irregularities in the land deals of Swarna Bharathi Trust. He initially penned a letter to Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu demanding the same, upon whose neglect he wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He alleged that Trust acquired some land and encroached the remaining government land (sikka land). He said that the trust has been harassing a farmer Narasimha Rao to evacuate more than 30 cents of land. He further said if the Prime Minister doesn’t investigate into this matter, CPI will trigger agitation. Ramakrishna even accused the trust of constructing a building as quid pro quo. He even quoted that Gali Janardhan Reddy once helped this trust.
