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Ahead of elections, Chandrababu Naidu mulls quota for economically backward sections
With hardly three months to go for the general elections the TDP government is raining sops on almost all sections of the electorate.
The Telugu Desam Party (TDP) government in Andhra Pradesh will pilot a bill for 10 per cent of reservations in jobs and in educational institutions to the economically backward sections (EBS) in the upcoming Assembly session, Minister for Information and Public Relations K. Srinivasulu said on Monday.
Five per cent of the EBS quota would be set aside for Kapus, a farming community, and the rest for other sections from the other upper castes, Srinivasulu said at a media briefing after the meeting of the council of ministers.
Earlier this month, the Parliament passed a bill for 10 per cent quota for EBS but the NDA government drew fire from the opposition parties who said the new reservation was part of the BJP’s election gimmick. Three BJP ruled states - Gujarat, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh have already announced their decision to implement the reservation.
The TDP came to power by securing Kapu votes in 2014 elections with a promise to accord Kapus the status of backward classes. The state government later piloted a bill in the Assembly seeking to include them under the backward classes list. But that bill is still to be approved by the NDA government.
With hardly three months to go for the general elections the TDP government is raining pre-poll sops on almost all sections of the electorate. The sops include a cash benefit of Rs 10,000 plus a smart phone for each of 94 lakh self help group (SHG) women under the Pasupu-Kunkuma scheme. The government has decided to spend Rs 9400 cr for implementing the scheme.
In 2014, the TDP had promised to write off loans worth 7,500 crore obtained by the SHG women from banks. Those loans are still in the process of being waived off. The SHG women account for 94 lakh out of the total female voters of 1.86 crore in Andhra Pradesh and the the TDP is clearly eyeing their votes.
On Monday, the cabinet resolved to extend an annual cash benefit of Rs 10,000 per acre for farmers and doubling old age pensions from Rs 1,000 to Rs 2,000 thereby ratifying Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu’s ‘Sankranti gift’ at a public rally in Nellore.
But the idea of loan waivers and cash assistance is not the TDP’s. In fact, freeing SHG women from bank loans, doubling of old age pensions and giving a cash assistance of Rs 50,000 to all small and middle farmers are a part of navaratnas — a bunch of nine major election promises designed by the Jagan Mohan Reddy’s Yuvajana Sramika Rytu Congress (YSRC).
In neighbouring Telangana, the Telangana Rastra Samithi had offered a cash incentive of Rs 8,000 per year for farmers under Rytu bandhu scheme ahead of the state elections in 2018 which the ruling party swept. Chandrababu Naidu now seems intent on taking a leaf from his Telangana counterpart K. Chandrasekhar Rao’s book to woo the farmers to retain power.
An official release from the Chief Minister’s office said the TDP government has spent Rs 24,518 crore in the last four years under the pension scheme covering 54 lakh beneficiaries.
Minister Srinivasulu said the hike in the old age pensions had effective right from January itself. Widows, aged, differently-abled, handloom weavers, toddy tappers, HIV patients, transgender, fishermen, single women, dialysis patients are covered under the pension scheme. According to official data 22,80,457 new pensions have been added to the list in the last four years and nine months of the TDP’s rule.
At Monday’s meeting, the government also decided to write off life tax for tractors and auto rickshaws and sanction the first instalment of dearness allowance for 12 lakh government employees and retired employees receiving pensions.
