Congress appeals to Left not to participate in agitation

Hyderabad, July 31 (UNI) The Congress Legislature Party (CLP) today appealed to the Left parties in the state not to participate in the land agitation as it was the agenda of both the government and Left parties to distribute lands to the poor in the state.

Talking to newspersons here, State Transport Minister Kanna Lakshminarayana said the government was committed to the welfare of the poor and had already distributed 4.37 lakh acres of land and constructed 19 lakh houses. The government had planned to construct 50 lakh houses, he added.

Mr Lakshminarayana, who was one of the members in the three-member ministerial committee to discuss the land agitation issue with the Left parties to avert the bandh on July 28, said though the government had agreed to almost all the demands of the Left parties, they did not cooperate with the government to avoid the bandh.

While terming the police firing as unfortunate, he said the government had immediately responded and ordered judicial inquiry into the incident, besides sanctioning ex-gratia of Rs five lakh, a house and a government job to the kin of the deceased.

Mr Lakshminarayana urged the Left parties to come forward to solve the problems and said the agitations were creating law and order problems in the state.

The Minister alleged that Telugu Desam Party President N Chandrababu Naidu, who did not think about the welfare of the poor during his nine-year rule in the state, was now talking about their good only to mislead the public.

He alleged the TDP was trying to politicise the firing incident to gain political advantage. The former TDP government did not pay even a single paise as exgratia to the kin of those killed in police firing in Basheerbagh incident, he added.

He ridiculed Mr Naidu's one-day fast today, demanding Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to visit Mudigonda village in Khammam District.

UNI