Taking Debts For The Welfare Of The People: Etela

The TRS government faced some serious flak in the Telangana Assembly today with the opposition Congress members K Jana Reddy and T Jeevan Reddy alleging that it had made the state critically debt-ridden in the last three years.

During Question Hour in the Legislative Assembly on Tuesday, the Congress members claimed that the debt as percentage of GDP at the national level was 33, but Telangana's debt level had reached 71. They alleged that Telangana stood first in debt - that the per capita debt of Telangana was Rs 40,000, and that it would get doubled by the end of 2018, pushing the state into a debt trap.

The questions were raised by Congress MLAs Thatiparthi Jeevan Reddy and Challa Vamshichand Reddy, and BJP MLAs G Kishan Reddy, Dr K Laxman, Chintala Ramachandra Reddy and N V S S Prabhakar in the Assembly during Question Hour.

Minister for Finance & Planning Etela Rajender then informed the House that the quantum of loans taken by the current state government from the Centre and other financial institutions till now was Rs 22,485.06 crores. The state government's total debts were Rs 1,35,554.03 crores, and the interest burden on the exchequer in 2016-17 was Rs 8,609.19 crores, he said.

Etela then proceeded to refute the allegations of the Congress members, saying that the government was taking debts for the welfare of the people.

He said that using the word of "oobi" (quicksand) was wrong, and explained that the government was bringing debts for the comprehensive development of the state. The government was changing its stances on debt in tune with the changing trends and economic thinking, and the state would develop only then, he claimed. Nothing except suicides, drought and hunger deaths would happen if there was no development, he said.