Severely castigating the state government's decision to
hike the power tariff, TDP MLA Motkupalli Narasimhulu stated his party's intention of going on a strike until the hike is rolled back.
"Despite it not being in the interest of the people, despite all the opposition parties protesting, going on dharnas, and taking up hunger strikes, the state government went ahead with increasing the tariff," said the MLA.
"However, we will continue our struggle against this, hand-in-hand with the Left-wing parties, until our demands are met," he added, going on to criticise the APERC for the way it "bowed down to corporate demands".
"Of what use is a Regulatory Commission that won't regulate? Salaries to its employees is yet another drain on the people's resources," he said.
Meanwhile, the CPI (M) state secretary B V Raghavulu has called for a state-wide bandh and a mass hunger strike, on Monday, 1 April, in protest against the steep increase in power charges, and alleged that government officials have been pocketing all the revenue generated from the increased tariffs.
"The Congress party came into power in 2009, piggybacking on promises of not hiking power tariffs. This is the second electricity tariff hike in as many years, and amounts to defrauding the people who trusted them enough to hand them over the government," said Raghavulu.
Alleging that the government works for its own profit, and not for the people, the CPI (M) leader said, "The burden being put on the people can only be for the profit of the distribution companies, who pressurised the ERC into giving in. It can only be that dishonest members of the Commission, Congress politicians, and the companies themselves, are hoarding the money being made with revenue gap as an excuse."