The Hindu : Front Page : 20 more Assembly seats: YSR’s target

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Thursday, May 15, 2008
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20 more Assembly seats: YSR’s target

‘Rededication Day’ marks completion of YSR government’s fourth year in office

PHOTO: P.V. SIVAKUMAR

ANTI-CLIMAX: Chief Minister Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy annoyed by the erratic singing of the National Anthem by Seva Dal men at the ‘Rededication Day’ of the Congress government in Hyderabad on Wednesday.

HYDERABAD: Gearing the cadre for the general elections due next year, the Congress leadership asked party leaders and cadre to work for securing at least 51 per cent votes in each Assembly constituency.

Given the series of welfare programmes and many more in the pipeline, it should not be a difficult task for the party to win at least 20 more Assembly and five Lok Sabha seats in 2009 than in the last elections.

“We have no objections if other parties like the Left want to sail with us. But the Congress should be prepared to go it alone,” Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy said.

He was delivering the concluding address at the ‘Rededication Day’, a one-day plenum of the Congress party, to mark the completion of four years in office on Wednesday.

The event was a low key affair going by the attendance of just 7,000 delegates.

Senior leaders, including M. Satyanarayana Rao, V.Purushottam Reddy and V. Hanumanth Rao and Union Ministers S. Jaipal Reddy and Renuka Chowdary, were not present and a majority of speakers focussed on showering accolades on the “dynamic” leadership of the Chief Minister.”

Leaders from Telangana including PCC president D. Srinivas were guarded in their criticism of TRS president K. Chandrasekhar Rao, but the Chief Minister was forthright in claiming that Mr. Rao would not have floated the TRS had he been inducted into the Cabinet after 1999 elections. Dr. Reddy criticised the CPI (M) for setting aside its principles in announcing that it would try to bring together the Telugu Desam and the proposed party by film star Chiranjeevi to defeat the Congress.

He wanted the people to compare between the nine-year rule of the Telugu Desam and four years of the Congress and decide as to which party had kept its promises. He urged the party cadre to be vigilant about traders hoarding commodities, besides bringing to the Government’s notice lapses in the implementation of welfare schemes during the “crucial election year”.

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