Congress senior leader and former Karimnagar MP Ponnam Prabhakar accused the Telangana government of neglecting the welfare of the weavers in the state.
Speaking to media persons, Ponnam said that of the nearly 80,000 powerloom units across Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, about 40,000 were located in Sircilla alone. However, despite making several promises during the elections, Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao had completely neglected the welfare of the thousands of weavers.
He informed that the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee had constituted a committee on February 3 to study the conditions of the powerloom industry in the state.
He said that the TPCC would launch a massive agitation, by taking the Padmashali community along, if the government failed to resolve the problems being faced by the weavers.
Ponnam said that the TRS government had not taken any action on the Mega Cluster which the previous Congress regime had proposed to set up at Sircilla. Further, no efforts had been made to revive the Azamjahi Mills.
Former minister G Prasad Rao, who heads the TPCC committee, said the previous Congress government had sanctioned Rs 130 crores for the powerloom industry. But those funds had not been released by the present government.
He said that the government had not even released the pending 50% subsidy, or its 20% contribution to the input subsidy released by the Centre.
Prasad Rao said that a proposal to set up an exclusive bank for weavers to provide them loans up to Rs 35,000 without security remained unimplemented.
He added that while Maharashtra and Gujarat were providing power at Rs 2 per unit to the powerloom industry, the TRS government was charging Rs 8 per unit.
He alleged that KCR had been making only fake promises. (INN)