TDP adopting ''Goebbelsian'' tactics, fearing drubbing: CM

Hyderabad, June 23 (UNI) Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy today claimed that the Opposition TDP was making a ''false propaganda'' of discrepencies in voters list, fearing defeat in the elections to Panchayat Raj Bodies.

Expressing confidence that the ruling Congress would record an impressive victory, including the Municipal and Cooperative polls, Dr Reddy told newspersons here that the TDP had no other issue to take up before the people. Hence it was trying to project ''non-issues as issues'', he added.

Taking a dig at the TDP, he sarcastically said ''For them, the way I laugh and sleep while helihopping is big issue''.

While his government had won appreciation from President A P J Abdul Kalam and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for various measures, including the irrigation initative, his predecessor N Chandrababu Naidu had failed ''miserably'' as leader of the Opposition and had gone to the extent of deliberately ''misleading the august Assembly'', he charged.

Denying the Opposition charge that there were gross discrepencies in electoral rolls, he alleged that many of the TDP leaders had filed appeals against removal of names of their sympathisers from the voters list.

Asked about the Revenue Employees Association's claim that some Mandal Revenue Officers, who had been placed under suspension, had acted only under pressure from the ruling Congress, he said it was the duty of such officers to make a complaint to their higher-ups when they faced intimidation from any political party.

The Election Commission would take appropriate action against any erring revenue employee, he added.

Asked about the comments of Pradesh Congress Chief K Keshava Rao and Union Minister of State for Rural Development and Senior TRS leader A Narendra against the single Judge's verdict, he said ''I am not holding a brief for any one.'' Dr Reddy opined that it was primarily the responsibility of each and every citizen to see whether one's name was in the electoral rolls or not during revision by the Election Commission.

UNI SM VV HS DS1623