Let’s send 100 BCs to Assembly, YSRCP dares TDP
: Aug 19, 2012

Hyderabad, August 19: Countering the TDP’s declaration to allot 100 tickets to BCs, YSRCP has come up with a proposal to reserve 100 seats to ensure political empowerment to the Backward Classes.

“If your intention of standing for the BC cause is genuine, we shall chalk out a strategy for reservation of BC seats to make sure that the Backward Classes represent 100 constituencies in the 294 member house,” Party Honorary President YS Vijayamma said in an open letter to TDP President N Chandrababu Naidu.

Let us join hands in the true political empowerment of BCs. Earlier, YS Jagan Mohan Reddy has proposed 33 per cent reservation to BCs in local bodies elections but since the matter is pending in court, if the major political parties sit together and come to an understanding we can make it, she said in the three-page letter released by party BC Cell Convener, Gattu Ramachandra Rao at a press conference here on Sunday.

“This is a revised proposal of YS Jagan Mohan Reddy. It is not 100 tickets but sending 100 BCs to the assembly that matters. Setting apart those constituencies reserved for SCs, STs and where minorities have a strong base, if all the parties arrive at a consensus to reserve the seats for BCs, it speaks of true empowerment and the marginalised section of the society will enter the assembly, irrespective of party affiliations,” he said quoting from YS VIjayamma’s letter.

If two major opposition parties come together on the issue, other parties will fall in line and this will prove N Chandrababu Naidu’s sincerity towards the BC cause, he said adding that TDP which made the same 100 seats promise in 2009 elections has given just 47 seats to BCs while YSR has given 67 seats, he said.
“It is not lip service but deeds that matter,” the Party has challenged N Chandrababu Naidu to shed his inhibitions and come clear on the BC reservations issue.

YS Vijayamma also lambasted the TDP President for his inept handling of issues, ranging from BC welfare, education to healthcare during his nine-year term. There was no fees reimbursement, nor was there medicare to the BCs and agriculture was totally neglected, artisans were cheated and power subsidy was stopped. Power tariff was hiked and user charges were slapped on the people at government hospitals. BCs bore the brunt and rejected TDP twice.

“If declaration of 100 seats to BCs comes now from TDP people are not in a position to believe as Chandrababu Naidu’s past haunts him. If TDP accepts our proposal of sending 100 BCs to the legislature then his declaration would be meaningful,” Gattu Ramachandra Rao said.