Will our political parties ever refrain from playing dirty politics? Nevertheless, some believe that a name change or freebies will help them gain support and return to power. It’s past time for politicians to start thinking about the wellbeing of the populace rather than just maintaining their positions of power.
They are just making the state where they are in power and the nation as a whole worse by forming new national parties, changing names when it is not necessary, announcing giveaways on election day, etc. Consider the Andhra Pradesh government’s decision to rename NTR Health University as YSR Health University. What would the YSRCP government hope to accomplish with this? NTR shouldn’t be seen as the TDP’s leader or a movie star.
He is the guy who helped Telugu get prominence on a national and worldwide scale. He has enacted a number of dramatic changes in the state. He continues to be regarded as the Telugu “Aradhya Daiwam” today.
People of Andhra Pradesh have a major complaint that the Central government, both the Congress in the past and the BJP-led NDA now, has not considered bestowing Bharat Ratna on him.
That being the stature of NTR, it is most unfortunate decision taken by YSRCP. The state BJP reacted opposing the move. But the question is what will they do now? Can they force the government to reverse the decision?
The university was established as University of Health Sciences by the Government of Andhra Pradesh and was inaugurated on April 9 by the then Chief Minister N T Rama Rao. It started functioning on November 1, 1986 with Rama Rao as the University’s first Chancellor. Following the death of NTR, a directive was issued by then Government of Andhra Pradesh to rename the university “Dr. NTR University of Health Sciences,” on February 2, 1998.
The only reason one can think of for taking such a decision could be that it is an attempt to divert the issue from the ongoing padayatra by the farmers of Amravati. The government, if it wanted, could have named any of the new 17 medical colleges, which Jagan claimed to be getting ready, in memory of YSR. No one would have objected as YSR was a practicing medical doctor before joining politics, had been a pioneer in taking quality medicare to the common people with his innovative Aarogyasri besides introducing the 108, 104 ambulance services in the State. Wouldn’t it have been appropriate to name one medical college in each of the 23 districts? YSR, certainly, is regarded as a great leader. But that does not mean that another great leader should be disrespected.
This decision has come as a shock even for many within the YSRCP. Some durbaris may praise him as a visionary and the social media which of late is turning into a menace as far as political comments are concerned. YSRCP may have political rivalry with TDP and it may even want to decimate the party totally, but changing the name of the founder of a university cannot be supported at any cost.
No wonder, the Chairman of Official Languages Commission Yarlagadda Lakshmi Prasad quit in protest. It would also be interesting to see what Lakshmi Parvati, the wife of NTR who is now in YSRCP and is always highly critical of TDP, would do now? She is known for giving lectures on the values and vision of NTR. #KhabarLive #hydnews #hyderabadlive
