Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao sought to clear the clouds of apprehension that NTR gardens on the banks of Hussain Sagar was being marginalisd. He said the NTR gardens would remain intact. ” It will remain there forever, ” he said addressing a galaxy of movie-stars and fans . KCR attended a program organized at Annapurna Studios on the occasion of launching for production of Goutami Putra Satakarni movie as chief guest. The movie is being produced as the 100 th movie of Tollywood hero Nandamuri Balakrishna and son of NT Ramarao.
Lauding Balakrishna for his acumen in choosing a theme of first glorious Telugu empire in South India, the chief minister said it would go down in the career of Balakrishna and history of Telugu people as a master piece. He would love to watch the movie on the first day itself as an emperor who heralded Telugu Salivahana era is being made into a movie. He hoped that the movie would run for 200 days.
Referring to the efforts of NT Ramarao in bringing global recognition to Telugu people, KCR praised the late thespian and chief minister of united Andhra Pradesh as the greatest leader of the Telugu lands ever produced. ” He was the pride out Telugu people. There has been some negative propaganda about the preservation of NTR memories in Hyderabad. Some people misread our intention and started saying that the NTR memorial and gardens would be marginalized. This is wrong. The memory of NTR will remain there forever. Take it from me, NTR was not an artiste of a single era. He belongs to many generations,” KCR said.
The controversy arose when Telangana government chose to install 125 feet tall statue of Ambedkar abutting NTR garden. Fears were expressed that the tallest statue would dwarf the NTR memorial. Even a few T-ministers also revealed that NTR memorial would be confined to the original four acres of land.
Another aspect that worried the admirers of NT Ramarao is that government has plans to develop a Smriti Vanam for Dr Ambedkar on 36 acres. It has given rise to fears that the Smriti Vanam would overlap the NTR gardens which has been developed on 34 acres.
The criticism against Telangana government’s plan was that Dr Ambdedkar’s statue venue had been chosen as part of the TRS grand plan to erase the memories of important political leaders who stood for united Andhra Pradesh.
KCR sought to reassure that as NTR was a great actor of Telugu states and his memories would be preserved.
