The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Naidu returns, gets down to business

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, May 09, 2009
ePaper | Mobile/PDA Version

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Naidu returns, gets down to business

Constituency-wise review of the party’s performance to be taken up from today

PHOTO: NAGARA GOPAL

Recharged: TDP president N. Chandrababu Naidu interacting with party election observers at NTR Bhavan in Hyderabad on Friday. —

HYDERABAD: Telugu Desam president N. Chandrababu Naidu, who returned from a brief holiday abroad on Friday, immediately got down to business and confabulated with senior party leaders on the modalities to be adopted for the six-day constituency-wise review of the party’s performance in recent elections, beginning on Saturday.

While some of the leaders met him at his residence soon after his arrival, Mr. Naidu later came to the party headquarters and held discussions with several of them. Those who attended the meeting included Ummareddy Venkateswarulu, M.V. Mysoora Reddy, Dadi Veerabhadra Rao and Pratibha Bharathi.

During the detailed review, booth-wise analysis of the party’s electoral performance in each of the 294 constituencies would be undertaken. Besides, the leadership would also look into whether the cadre and party leaders cooperated with each other to ensure the success of the nominees or were there any attempts to undermine it. The meetings would also look into the cooperation extended by friendly parties.

‘Consult Opposition’

Meanwhile, maintaining that the government was “lame duck” and had no right to take “unilateral decisions”, the Telugu Desam asked it to consult the Opposition on tackling important public problems, including the type of investigation into the Secretariat fire accident.

Poser to government

At a press conference here on Friday, senior TDP leaders M.V. Mysoora Reddy and Ummareddy Venkateswarulu said that until the election process was over and a new government ushered in, officials come under the jurisdiction of the Election Commission.

Since the government could not take any decision on its own during the interregnum, it should consult Opposition parties on crucial issues to ensure transparency and good governance. On the Secretariat fire, they said it had to be investigated whether it was an accident or a conspiracy.

Dismissing the government’s claims that the Opposition was making “baseless allegations” with regard to the fire, they asserted that several doubts would naturally arise in view of its past record.

Besides, there were many corruption charges against the government.

The leaders wondered why the server room, where the short circuit occurred, was locked when it should have been manned round-the-clock.

They demanded the service agreement with the IT company to be made public. They sought to know how the files alone were not destroyed when the computers and furniture were gutted.

They pointed out that ten fire accidents had occurred in the Secretariat since 2004. Why the fire and smoke alarms, installed at a cost of Rs.1.6 crore, did not go off when the fire broke out in the ‘D’ Block which housed important departments.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Andhra Pradesh

News Update

Stories in this Section