Stop Duping Dalits: Jeevan Reddy To KCR

Congress leader and MLC T Jeevan Reddy today slammed Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrshekar Rao for allegedly "playing with the sentiments" of the Dalits of the state.

Talking to the media about the CM's "unjust" treatment of the Dalits, Reddy accused KCR of having cheated the community by initially promising to appoint a Dalit leader as the first CM of the state but then taking the post for himself.

He said that the TRS supremo, who had tried to rectify the situation by appointing a Dalit leader to the post of deputy CM during his first term in office, did not do even that much during his second term, and added, "Why didn't KCR appoint his Cabinet colleague Koppula Eshwar to the post?"

Claiming that only one Dalit had been included in the state Cabinet when three leaders from the community should have been made ministers based on the system of proportional representation, the MLC demanded that KCR make the Dalits, who constitute 15% of Telangana's population, a larger part of its governance systems.

Continuing his attack on the CM, he then said that KCR's leadership and actions were "hurting the feelings" of the Dalits, and pointed out that the CM had not kept its promise of providing three acres of land to every eligible Dalit household in Telangana.

The Congress leader alleged that the government had deprived 35,000 unemployed Dalit persons of jobs by refusing to fill vacant government positions. He added that the CM was providing aid of only Rs 10 lakh to the community instead of Rs 30 lakh, in lieu of the promised three-acre land package, under the new Dalit Bandhu scheme.

"KCR has no right to seek the votes of the Dalits until he solves all their problems. They will use elections to remind the CM of their self-respect and strength till he does so," Reddy thundered.