TDP targets Modi for ‘bias’ in allocating grants

Suresh Dharur

Tribune News Service

Hyderabad, April 26

After snapping ties with the BJP and exiting the NDA over denial of special category status to Andhra Pradesh, the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) has now found a new weapon to “expose the bias and duplicity” of Prime Minister Narendra Modi: Dholera smart city project.

The Prime Minister’s dream project in Gujarat has been sanctioned Rs 44,000 crore by the Centre, while ignoring the basic requirements of AP’s new capital city Amaravati, the TDP alleged.

The Centre had sanctioned a mere Rs 2,500 crore for Amaravati and released Rs 1,500 crore during the past four years, while Dholera, a smart city being developed in Modi’s home state, has been sanctioned Rs 44,000 crore out of which Rs 5,000 crore had already been released, TDP spokesperson and MP K Ramamohan Rao said.

The TDP’s contention is that Gujarat has a well-developed capital city in addition to other four big cities and now Dholera is being developed on a massive scale, while AP has no capital city after the state’s bifurcation.

“In all fairness, AP should get priority over Dholera in Gujarat,” Rao said. Charging the BJP leaders with “duplicity”, he said while the “BJP leaders question us for acquiring 33,00 acres for building Amaravati, the Gujarat Government is acquiring around one lakh acres for Dholera”.

“If it does not respect the sentiments of the Andhra people, the BJP will face the same fate as the Congress in the state and will get wiped out,” the TDP leader warned.