BJP TDP responsible for farmers' suicides says Sonia

Kadapa, Andhra Pradesh, Sep 27 (UNI)Holding the ''insensitive policies'' of the BJP-led NDA government at the Centre and the TDP government in Andhra Pradesh responsible for the mass suicides of farmers, AICC Chief and UPA Chairperson Ms Sonia Gandhi today declared that the UPA government would soon unveil a financial package for the 16 drought-hit districts of Andhra Pradesh.

Hinting at a package similar to the one announced to ameliorate the drought and debt-ridden farmers in Vidarbha, the AICC Chief, during her eight-hour visit to Kadapa and Kurnool districts, said the Congress-led UPA government at the Centre and the Rajasekhara Reddy government in Andhra Pradesh were trying to reverse the suicide trend.

She said both the governments were attaching special importance to the problems of the farming community and workers in the rural areas. They were focusing on the improvement of their living conditions.

She said due to the initiatives taken by the Centre and State governments, the suicides of farmers had considerably come down.

Addressing public meetings at both the places which were attended by lakhs of people who lustily cheered her, Ms Gandhi said the people of Andhra Pradesh who always stood by Congress party, and assured the state government that it would stand by it in its massive irrigation initiative taken up at a cost of Rs 60,000 crore to irrigate 73 lakh acres of land.

Ms Gandhi inaugurated the state-of-the-art Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences and released water from the Brahmasagar reservoir in Kadapa district and unveiled the statue of former Chief Minister Kotla Vijaya Bhaskara Reddy at Kurnool.

She later flew in to Hyderabad from where she left for New Delhi.

UNI Team/JRK VV VD KN1942