Every Day Reveals A New Side Of The Inhuman Face Of This TDP Regime  

Turakasasanam, Srikakulam district: My Padayatra proceeded through Sompeta and Mandasa mandals today. This morning a couple, Bharathi and Praveen met me. They recalled the contribution of my father and expressed their gratitude to him for the way in which they personally benefited from his governance. My father’s pioneering fee reimbursement scheme in education, helped Bharathi become a doctor, she said. Her brother also could complete his engineering and is now employed, they said.

Praveen said he was a beneficiary of loan waivers and free power under my father’s rule, and was also given a house under Indiramma housing scheme. When their child suffered burns in a blaze at their house, plastic surgery was performed free of cost under the pioneering healthcare initiative launched by my father, Arogyasri.

“Can a poor farmer’s family benefit in such multiple ways, had it not been for your father?", they asked. Speaking these words, they were overcome with emotion. I felt overjoyed to see these people who had benefited so richly from my father’s welfare governance which was aimed at improving the lot of the common man. What more does a man need to find a lasting place in the hearts of people in the way my father did?

Patients of kidney disease met me along my Padayatra today. A number of kidney disease patients from Loharibanda met me today. They told me that in this panchayat alone. there were hundreds of patients suffering from kidney ailments. Several people died of kidney diseases recently, giving a tragic turn to this entire problem. The TDP government in spite of such tragedies, remained unmoved. That is the worst and most inhuman part of the situation.

The village consists predominantly of Yadavas and fishermen. Burdened by loans and stricken with kidney diseases, they are being forced to sell their lands. They are not getting pensions and do not get any medicines either. Doctors are inaccessible even in hospitals. They do not have bus passes and are being asked to wait for a month when they go for dialysis.

Out of sheer compulsion, these villagers go to private hospitals. Others who cannot afford private healthcare wait for their inevitable deaths, they lamented. I felt overcome with sorrow when I heard of their plight. I learnt that there was no proper drinking water supply to this village. Villagers complained that even the drinking water they were supplied with was muddied and contaminated. This is nothing but criminal neglect on the part of the TDP government.

Ramesh Chowdary, a tenant farmer’s son from Goudagoranti met me. He told me that he had undergone a kidney transplant surgery four years ago. Because they said Arogyasri did not cover the surgery and with no assistance from the chief minister’s relief fund, he had to sell whatever property he had. He had to borrow lakhs of rupees to cover his medical expenses. He told me that he spent Rs.15,000 on medicines every month apart from Rs.10,000 on interest, as tears welled up in his eyes. How can an ordinary tenant farmer’s family survive in such difficult circumstances when they have to spend Rs. 25,000 each month?

I have a question for the chief minister—because of non-payment of Rs.500 crores of bills, Arogyasri services have come to a standstill. While you spend hundreds of crores of public money for your jaunts, on your so-called Dharma Porata Deeksha, on publicity campaigns portraying you providing relief, with pictures of you giving cheques (invalid ones) to cyclone victims, isn’t it inhuman on your part not to release funds to save the lives of the poor?