BRS Slams CM's Muslim Representation As 'Tokenism'

BRS senior leader Shaik Abdullah Sohail today accused Chief Minister Revanth Reddy of practising tokenism instead of transformation by appointing former cricketer Mohammed Azharuddin as a minister to divert attention from two years of broken promises to Telangana's Muslim community.

Addressing the media, Sohail said that Reddy's campaign in the Jubilee Hills by-election was built on symbolism rather than substance. Calling the two-year delay in Muslim representation in the Cabinet a "political sin dressed up as redemption", Sohail said, "Denying representation for two years was an injustice; appointing one minister now is not a favour - it's damage control."

He alleged that the Congress government had betrayed the entire community by shelving its Minority Declaration commitments. He accused the party of turning empowerment into empty rhetoric, citing the Rs 1,000-crore subsidised loan scheme for minority youth and women that he claimed had not benefited a single person. Of the Rs 300 crore allocated in 2024-25, only Rs 1 lakh was spent - mostly on office expenses, he said.

"Budgets without disbursals are lies on paper," Sohail said, and accused the government of mastering "the art of announcements without delivery".

The BRS leader also alleged that the government had failed in both employment and education initiatives, and cited as an example the Abdul Kalam Taufa-e-Taleem scheme, which he claimed never saw the light of day.

He also criticised the recently announced Indiramma Minority Mahila Yojana and Revanth Anna Ka Sahara as "cosmetic band-aids", and claimed that less than 1% of the promised funds had been released.

"Under the BRS regime, minority welfare was routine, not rhetoric," he claimed, and demanded the immediate revival of the loan and educational aid programs.