The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Abolish regional boards: BJP

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, May 07, 2007
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Abolish regional boards: BJP

Special Correspondent

`They were formed without funds, powers'

Ch. Vidyasagar Rao

HYDERABAD: Former Union Minister Ch. Vidyasagar Rao has demanded abolition of the recently announced regional development boards, maintaining that their setting up was "unconstitutional."

At a press conference here on Sunday, he said revival of the boards was `undemocratic' and violated the 74th constitutional amendment. He faulted the Government for constituting the boards without "powers and funds."

The BJP leader, who is also chairman of the party's Telangana Udyama Porata Committee, termed the Congress-Telangana Rashtra Samiti pre-poll agreement in 2004 as the "biggest fraud" on the people.

Plea to Kalam

He said a convener and two joint conveners of the committee would be appointed for each district. Signatures of all village sarpanches would be taken on the memorandum the party proposed to submit to President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam this month, for a separate State.

The BJP leader urged the Government to distribute assigned, Government and other disputed lands to the poor in non-tribal areas. He faulted the earmarking of land for Infosys at Pocharam. "That land belongs to the poor and it should be restored to them," he said.

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