The Hindu : Pensioners not to vote for TDP

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Nov 13, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Andhra Pradesh

Pensioners not to vote for TDP

By Our Staff Reporter

HYDERABAD NOV. 12. The 5 lakh-member Pensioners' Association in the State has taken a unanimous decision not to vote for the Telugu Desam in the coming elections for its arbitrary decision of stopping dearness relief to them since July, 2001.

The association president, Thirumala Setty Gopalakrishnamurthy, told mediapersons here on Wednesday that the State Government pensioners had been denied five instalments of Dearness Relief (DR) so far. Though pensioners had been drawing DR along with employees for over two-and-a-half decades, the Government, citing paucity of funds, had stopped the payment.

As a result, 70 per cent of pensioners were drawing less than Rs.2,000 as pension, that was hardly adequate to meet their basic needs. The vice-president, A. Pratap Reddy, and the secretary-general, K. Madan Mohan, said the DR was nothing but compensation for rising prices and the Supreme Court had observed that paucity of funds was no excuse to stop payment.

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