The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Firing salvos unabated News analysis

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Monday, Oct 22, 2007
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Firing salvos unabated News analysis

S. Nagesh Kumar

HYDERABAD: The whole of last week Chief Minister Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy and Telugu Desam Party president N. Chandrababu Naidu expended considerable energies challenging each other to submit to a commission to inquire into the wealth accumulated since entering politics three decades ago.

By innuendo and explicitly too, each alleged that the other had misused his position and influence as Chief Minister to perpetuate business interests. Mr. Naidu triggered the controversy by accusing Dr. Reddy’s family of amassing assets worth a staggering Rs. 29,784 crore by earning Rs. 1 crore every hour during YSR’s 1,241 days in office. Stung by this rather unusual formulation, Dr. Reddy offered to face an inquiry commission and threw the gauntlet at Mr. Naidu by asking him to do likewise.

Court ruling

Accepting the challenge, Mr. Naidu wanted a sitting judge to head the commission, a demand that Dr. Reddy rejected, citing the Supreme Court’s recent ruling against appointing judges to head inquiry commissions unless the issue involved paramount national interest.

But, Leader of Opposition insisted on convincing the Apex Court to spare a serving judge as there could be no other important situation than this! He said he feared that the Chief Minister would handpick a retired judge and the outcome would be predictable. Giving the inquiry a decent burial, Dr. Reddy foreclosed his earlier option of filing a defamation suit against Mr. Naidu on the ground that it would serve no political purpose. So much for the faith of two leaders holding Constitutional positions in the processes of law.

Escaped scrutiny

As of now, both of them have escaped an objective scrutiny of their wealth. It is no secret that families of both Dr. Reddy and Mr. Naidu overtly run business empires whose turnover runs into hundreds of crores. Mr. Naidu’s wife, Ms. Bhuvaneshwari, presides over the destinies of the multi-crore Heritage Foods that owns a chain of milk chilling units and supplies milk to lakhs of households. It recently diversified into retail business by launching a string of outlets. Dr. Reddy declared in the Assembly that his son Y. S. Jaganmohan Reddy was worth at least Rs. 140 crore. A third-generation businessman, Jaganmohan Reddy is into power generation, among other things. His grandfather Y. S. Raja Reddy was a big player in mining of barytes, a mineral used for oil exploration, and faced inquiries into allegations of illegal exploitation.

All this information has been chronicled by the media and is in public domain. Now, the fuss is apparently over the question whether their families’ wealth is legitimate or ill-gotten. Having openly agreed to face an inquiry into this question and being votaries of transparency in public life, both leaders owe it to the people to at least disclose comprehensive details of their wealth earned by their families since 1978.

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