R-Day speech: Governor skips mention of prices, Telangana

What little hopes the people of the state had about the government waking up out of its slumber to take corrective measures to contain the spiralling prices of essential commodities were dashed on hearing Governor ESL Narasimhan's speech at Parade Grounds on the Republic Day on Wednesday.

The Governor’s speech was devoid of any mention of any attempt by his government to contain the spiralling prices of essential commodities or measures to arrest the prices of petroleum products. In fact, the speech left out subjects concerning the common man except in passing by saying that the fruits of development take long to reach the people.

Ironically, the previous year saw a violent uprising by pro-Telangana agitators and it continues to hinder Racha Banda but this subject also never found a place in Mr Narasimhan’s address.

His speech obviously a dictation of the government hardly mentioned a word whether the living conditions or the cost of living would be high on their agenda, nor did he spell out steps to check rampant and unabated corruption that was taking the toll of the exchequer.

Mr Narasimhan, who after unfurling the National Flag, read out the speech prepared for him.

This speech summed up what 'his' government had achieved for the last six years under three chief ministers. The speech admitted that "we (the government) should not feel complacent".

Good sense prevailed over the respected Governor who skipped no chance to say, "It is not enough for the government to be content with mere formulation of welfare schemes."

He also exhorted the need to "have feed back in the efficacy of the programmes and examine the bottlenecks to tone up the delivery mechanism". It was in this context that 'Racha Banda' made its presence felt in his speech along with the steps being taken up to ameliorated the grievances of the poor.

In tune with the larger sections, particularly the enormous number of BPL families, higher education has been referred to as a 'dream' by him and "sadly that remains unfulfilled for many."   

Contrasted to 43 per cent BCs, 15 per cent SCs, 7 per cent STs plus the economically poor among the minorities - constituting around 70 percent poor (out of 8 crore population), the Governor admitted that just 26 lakh of them were availing the benefit of pursuing higher education including professional programmes for which Rs 2300 crore has been earmarked, Rs 15,000 crore disbursed to the target groups under MGNREG scheme. The Rs 2 a kg rice through PDS covers two crore households. It was also mentioned that 85 percent gain through the PDS with an outlay of Rs 3000 crore.

The Governor sought the people's support and cooperation to strengthen the agriculture while asserting that with an outlay of Rs 58000 crore 12 irrigation projects were completed to irrigate 26 lakh acres, 43 new irrigation projects in two years would envisage irrigation of 38 lakh acres. Mr Narasimhan also claimed that AP registered 11.23 percent growth in agriculture despite unprecedented havoc by periodical floods.

Mentioning the new industrial policy 2010-2015 which had been unveiled recently was stipulated to attract Rs 15000 crore worth investments, the Governor said that it would create five lakh jobs.

He also said that the software exports were scheduled to reach Rs 70,000 crore by 2015.

 So what did the Governor actually say? He forgot to mention the dark recent past in which farmers and students committed suicides and instead focussed on the ‘achievements’ of the government during the past three years.

Mr Narasimhan said that, “despite various financial problems the state was facing, the state government has laid stress on the farmers’ problems and taken various welfare measures for their uplift.”

The Governor claimed to have taken initiatives to improve infrastructure and delivery mechanisms stabilizing the agrarian economy, particularly after being concerned over the plight of farmers.

He mentioned the free power supply to the farming community since 2004, and did say that the total subsidies provided to farm sector has crossed Rs 4,400 crore in the fiscal 2010-11.

In addition to free power supply, he said the government has provided credit coverage through a comprehensive state credit plan by mobilizing banks and cooperative bodies.

He said the `Pavala Vaddi’ scheme has been extended to all crop loans of farming community.

The Governor said government has been making efforts to provide seeds, fertilizers and pesticides at subsidized rate and bringing fruits of technology for the benefit of farm sector through innovative extension programmes—Rythu Chaitanya Yatras and Polam Badi.

Mr Narasimhan said the agriculture and allied sectors in the country registered a growth of 3.37 while AP growth stands at 11.23 in the first half of fiscal 2010-11.

He said cyclones in November and December damaged the harvested crop in more than 28 lakh acres in 669 mandals in 15 districts and 20 lakh small and marginal and tenant farmers were adversely affected.

He appealed all sections of people to act with maturity, maintain peace and public order as well as eschew violence in all forms.

Earlier, Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy paid rich tributes at Army Martyrs statue at Parade Grounds.

The Governor’s wife Vimala Narasimhan, Home Minister Sabitha Indra reddy, IT Minister P Lakshmaiah, Minister for Heavy Industries J Geetha Reddy, Cooperative Minister Kasu Venkata Krishna Reddy, Marketing and Warehousing Minister Mukesh Goud, Minister for Women and Child Welfare Sunitha Lakshma Reddy, Handlooms and Textiles Minister P Shankar Rao and Mayor Banda Karthika Chandra Reddy  were present.