Southern States - Andhra Pradesh   

Naidu pulls up two Ministers for `laxity'

By Our Special Correspondent

HYDERABAD SEPT. 14. The Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and Telugu Desam Party president, N. Chandrababu Naidu, now in Italy, today expressed unhappiness over the `inactive role' of two Ministers from Medak district — C. Muthyam Reddy and P. Babu Mohan — in the `Inti Intiki Telugu Desam' campaign.

Their "laxity" in distributing voters' lists was reported to have created serious problems the party cadre in visiting individual households to verify names of people who were actually enlisted and had obtained photo identity cards.

At a 45-minute-long teleconference from Milan, Italy, with the party leaders here to review the progress of the TDP's door-to-door campaign, Mr. Naidu expressed annoyance that the lists had not reached the cadre even on the third day of the campaign.

The TDP high command had entrusted to the Ministers the task of obtaining voters' lists from revenue officials in their respective districts and furnishing them to booth-level cadre. A senior party leader said that the Medak district TDP chief reported that there were huge gaps in the campaign as no lists were received from the Ministers.

Mr. Muthyam Reddy and Mr. Babu Mohan could not be contacted by party office-bearers since they were busy participating in various programmes.

The Telugu Desam president, who made a detailed review of the role of office-bearers and whether the campaign material had reached the cadre, also ordered the Chittoor district unit to nominate a leader to supervise the campaign in place of Patnam Subbaiah, former Minister, who is indisposed.

Mr. Naidu will hold another teleconference from Italy on Monday for which 20 telephone lines have been leased for interacting with 16 district in-charges and with State-level party leaders. On Saturday, he had spoken to Bhooma Nagi Reddy, TDP MP, and tried to assuage his feelings following reports that he had threatened to resign from the party protesting against the Government's decision to release more water from the Srisailam reservoir for crops in the Krishna delta to the detriment of farmers in Rayalaseema.

Watches Grand Prix

Mr. Naidu today watched the Italian Grand Prix at Monza and inspected the site of the Formula I track. Accompanied by two Ministers — Y. Ramakrishnudu and K. Vidyadhara Rao — and the Indian Olympic Association president, Suresh Kalmadi, and film actor Nagarjuna, Mr. Naidu sat through the 53-lap race which was won by Michael Schumacher.

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