Opposition leader and YSR Congress president YS Jaganmohan Reddy said the Adivasi MLAs belonging to YSR party would not allow the bauxite mined from the Agency area of Visakhapatnam district.
Addressing a mammoth public meeting in Chintapalli village in Agency area that fall in the bauxite belt, he said Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu’s white paper on the bauxite was bunch of lies. Recalling Naidu’s claim that village councils (grama sabha) had given consent to the bauxite mining, Jagan asked Jerrela Sarpanch Vijayakumari to tell the people if CM’s claim was correct. The sarpanch said no such decision had been taken by grama sabha. Instead, she said, members of the grama sabha opposed the project and it was recorded in the books of gram panchayat.
Jagan slammed Naidu’s failure to appoint tribal advisory committee (TAC) which is mandatory for to accord clearance for the project. “Naidu’s government is postponing the appointment of the TAC. As per the rule, three fourth of the members of the TAC should be MLAs from Tribal communities. In the Andhra Pradesh there are seven Tribal MLAs and six of them are from YSR Congress. This is the reason for the non-appointment of TAC. We won’t allow the project implemented without the approval of TAD. We have enough strength to stall the approval of the TAC,” he claimed.
The opposition leader accused Naidu of first initiating the process for the mining of bauxite in 2000 itself. ” Naidu as CM also got the proposal cleared by the TAC filled with his own party MLAs. But his plan could not be materialized because of Naidu’s defeat in 2004,” Jagan said. He added any attempt by any chief minister, whether it was YSR or Naidu or somebody else, to exploit the Bauxite against the will of the tribal people was wrong.
” It was true Rajaseekhar Reddy as chief minister did try to mine the bauxite in the early days of his government. But, he set the proposal aside honoring the sentiments of the tribal people. If Rajasekhar Reddy had wanted to mine the Bauxite he could have done it easily, given his influence at the centre. He respected the sentiments of Adivasis and stopped the project. However, a Congress chief minister, who came after YSR, got the clearance for the second phase of the bauxite mining,” he said.
Jagan ridiculed Naidu’s statement that he was not aware of the GO No 97 released last month to transfer the forest land to AP Mineral Development Corporation.
“Naidu says he has kept the GO 97 in abeyance. If he is sincere he should instruct the officials to withdraw the GO. The chief minister is not sincere. He is hoodwinking the adivasis by propagating lies,” Jagan said. The Opposition leader dared Naidu to set up gram sabhas and tribal advisory committee and get the proposal cleared as advised by the centre before going ahead on the project. Jagan made it clear that his party would not allow the bauxite ore move an inch from the agency area come what may.
