TRS Misused Public Money For KCR Birthday: Congress

Former minister Mohammed Ali Shabbir strongly condemned the "misuse of the state's exchequer" for the celebration of the birthday of Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao on Thursday.

Shabbir Ali said that the Telangana Minorities Residential Educational Institutions Society (TMREIS) had issued an order on February 16 asking the Principals of all schools to organise programs in connection with the birthday of KCR.

Each school was sanctioned Rs. 10,000 to conduct a skit/drama, plantations, distributions of sweets, recreation games and awards.

The schools were also asked to hold programs discussing the role played by KCR in the formation of Telangana state, and other initiatives like Mission Bhagiratha, Palle Pragathi, the Kaleshwaram lift irrigation project and other welfare schemes.

The Congress leader said that this expenditure from the state's exchequer to celebrate KCR's birthday was an open misuse of public money.

"Why is taxpayers' money being used to celebrate the birthday of KCR?" he asked.

He also accused the Chief Minister of misusing government schools like TMREIS and other institutions to spread TRS propaganda.

"Children belonging to the poor and middle classes study in the TMERIS and other social welfare schools. Instead of imparting them proper education, the KCR government is misusing them as a platform to spread falsehood and lies," he claimed.

He said that all political leaders celebrated their birthdays on a grand scale. But they did so either by spending their own money or with their followers taking care of the expenses. However, KCR was treating Telangana as his personal "jagir" (fiefdom) and misusing the state's exchequer to celebrate his own birthday, Shabbir Ali lamented.

He further said that hundreds of crores of public money had been spent by the TRS government to publish advertisements and carry out other such promotional activities on KCR's birthday.

"The Congress will collect data from the available resources and explore legal means to recover this money from the TRS, which is among the richest regional parties in the country," he said.

The Congress leader also condemned the arrests of TPCC President A Revanth Reddy and other Congress leaders on Thursday.

"This was the second day in a row that Congress leaders were either illegally arrested or placed under house arrests. This behaviour by the KCR government is totally intolerable in a democracy. We just demanded that KCR issue notifications to fill the 1.91 lakh vacancies in various departments of the state government, and to fulfill his electoral promise of giving Rs. 3,106 to the 40 lakh jobless youth of Telangana. These fair demands on behalf of the jobless youth angered KCR and he ordered our illegal arrests or house arrests," he said.

He added that the Congress would intensify its agitation against rising unemployment in Telangana, and claimed that its leaders would not get intimidated by the hollow threats and cheap tactics of the KCR government.