Congress Alleges Huge Scam In Kaleshwaram & Dummugudem Tende

Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) President & Nalgonda MP N Uttam Kumar Reddy alleged that Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao was indulging in massive corruption by manipulating the tenders of the Kaleshwaram project and the Dummugudem project worth over Rs. 24,000 crore.

In a live interaction with senior party leaders through a video-conference on Tuesday, Reddy said that while the entire world was busy fighting the coronavirus, KCR and his close relatives were busy taking 8% commission as kickbacks from the contractors of the Kaleshwaram projects.

"This massive corruption in irrigation projects is happening when there is a total lockdown and no one can come out. The tender was called for and closed during the lockdown period. Hence, there was no serious global bidding. As per our information, the cost estimates have gone up by 30-40% at the cost of the public exchequer, and huge 8% commission arrangements have been entered into between the contractors and the powers that be," he alleged.

Reddy alleged that the Chief Minister, who also holds the irrigation portfolio, and his relatives benefited from the manipulations in the tender process.

"We demand that these tenders be cancelled and fresh tenders be called on a global scale," he demanded.

Stating that today (May 12) was the last date for submitting bids for the Dummugudem project, Reddy alleged that there was a meeting at the behest of the Chief Minister?with regard to a Rs. 3,000 crore tender, and that it had been manipulated.

He claimed that L&T would be awarded the tender when it opens tomorrow.

"If this is not manipulated, then how would we know who is bidding and who is getting the L1 price?" he asked.

"L&T was not initially qualified for the Dummugedem project. But manipulations were done over the last 10 days to make it eligible to enter the tender process," he alleged.

Reddy also said that it was highly unfortunate that CM KCR had remained silent on the works being taken up by the Andhra Pradesh government over the last six months to draw an additional 4 TMC of water from Pothireddypadu.

"The KCR government is spending about Rs 1 lakh crore to get 2 TMC water through lift irrigation. Besides capital, the government will have to spend another Rs 10,000 crore on electricity, maintenance and manpower. However, the Srisailam water, which is supposed to come to us by gravity, is being taken away by the AP government, and KCR hardly made any noise till yesterday," he said.

The TPCC chief announced that the Congress would take up this issue to the public as a gross failure of KCR, and expose his "collusion" with Jagan Mohan Reddy.

"AP's plans for Pothireddypadu will destroy the irrigation in the entire Krishna Basin, and deprive Mahabubnagar, Nalgonda, Khammam and other districts of their due share of water. This will destroy the very purpose of the formation of Telangana state," he said.

He added that the Congress would approach all legal forums to get justice.