Press Releases Archive

Lok Satta initiative to resolve Political crisis

With normalcy and peace gaining ground gradually in the trouble-torn Telanagana, Coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema regions of the State, the Lok Satta is taking the initiative to ascertain public opinion on the political crisis and how an honorable settlement acceptable to all can be hammered out.

Party spokespersons Mr. V.Laxman Balaji, Mrs. K. Geetha Murthy told the details here in a media conference today.

The Lok Satta will carry out the exercise in two phases. In the first phase, three teams comprising three or four members of the party’s Core Committee will visit three districts each for three days in Telangana, excluding Hyderabad. The teams will interact with party leaders and workers in districts and workers in districts on the conflicting demands for forming Telangana State and for keeping the State united, and on the ways of finding a peaceful, acceptable solution.

In the second phase, 30 members of the Core Committee, drawn from all the three regions in the State, will visit Visakhapatnam, Kurnool and Warangal, visit a nearby village, conduct a gram sabha and ascertain people’s views on the political crisis. The same day, they will organize an open forum of discussion in the three district headquarters.

The two-pronged exercise aims at finding out how the interests of the other regions can be taken care of if Telangana State were to be formed and how the problems and aspirations of Telangana are to be addressed if the State were to be kept united.

The Lok Satta Party has all along maintained that not even God can fulfill the rival demands for Telangana formation and an integrated Andhra Pradesh simultaneously. A permanent settlement acceptable to all regions of the State has to be worked out only through negotiations. The Lok Satta Party believes that a win-win solution cannot emerge unless all the stakeholders are prepared to adopt a give-and-take approach. The Lok Satta, therefore, is trying to delineate the broad contours of a possible settlement after discussions with people at the grassroots, and district-level opinion leaders.

The following are the members of teams who will be going round Telangana districts from January 8 to 12:

Adilabad, Warangal and Karimnagar: G. Raj Reddy, M. Satyanarayana, and P. Ravi Maruth

Ranga Reddy and Nizamabad: N. Ravinder, Bandaru Rammohan Rao, Mrs. D. Lakshmi and Mrs. Y. Ramadevi

Khammam, Mahbubnagar and Nalgonda: V. Vijayender Reddy, E. Chennaiah and P. Bhaskara Rao

Mr. Y. D. Rama Rao, Mr. Vijayender Reddy and Raj Reddy will organize the 30-member team’s visit to Visakhapatnam on January 19, Kunrool on January 21. and Warangal on January 23.

Mr. V. Ramachandraiah, chairman of the Party’s disciplinary committee, said that he had issued notices to Mr. K. Dharma Reddy, Mr. M. Jaswanth Reddy, Mr. Nagaraju and Mr. Trivedi, asking them to explain why disciplinary action should not be taken against them for abusing and attempting to physically assault colleagues recently at the Party headquarters. Pending their explanation they had been stripped of their responsibilities.

Friday, January 8, 2010 - 15:59

Parties equally to blame for RTC fare hike: Lok Satta

Political parties in the State should share the responsibility with the State Government and the RTC for the hefty increase in fares, said the Lok Satta Party here today.

Talking to the media, party Vice President Y. D. Rama Rao, General Secretary Katari Srinivasa Rao and Secretary Ravi Maruth pointed out that the parties which had indulged in competitive damage to and destruction of buses and disruption of services in the name of rasta rokos and bandhs and forced the hike in fares were indulging in hypocrisy by launching a movement for a rollback of the fares. The parties should realize at least now that it is the common man that has to pay a price ultimately for the destruction indulged in by parties. Political parties should come up with alternative forms of protest to bandhs and rasta rooks.

The Lok Satta leaders underlined that by raising the fares abnormally, the RTC was unwittingly driving the people to switch from public to private transport. Proliferation of private vehicles would merely worsen the already chaotic and clogged transport system in urban areas.

That the RTC Managing Director reportedly decided on hiking fares without taking the Transport Minister and the Chief Minister into confidence mirrored the chaos that had overtaken administration, said the Lok Satta leaders.

The Lok Satta leaders wanted the RTC to withdraw the fare hike and focus on augmenting its revenue by focusing on alternative sources like plugging leakages in cargo and parcel transport.

The Lok Satta Party leaders also took at a dig at parties which vied with one another in fomenting hatred among people on the basis of religion, region, caste and language and turned a blind eye to aspects like education ahd health care which had a great bearing on people’s lives. That students in only 261 of the total 64,860 primary and upper primary schools in Andhra Pradesh are in a position to read and write flawlessly underlined the sorry state of affairs. According to a Rajiv Education Mission study, there are as many as 14 districts with less than 10 good schools. Successive Governments’ criminal negligence accounts for the deterioration in educational standards.

Thursday, January 7, 2010 - 16:59

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