In any state, welfare schemes for citizens are kept above the developmental activities to gain the confidence and give them immediate releif for their promised agendas. This is adopted by Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy under his rule.
The Jaganmohan Reddy government appears to be making deliberate attempts, against the backdrop of Andhra Pradesh’s dire financial situation, to convince people to shift their attention from the intangible benefits of developmental work to what they had tangibly obtained from the government, particularly under its numerous welfare schemes.
Jagan has urged people to focus solely on the assistance they have received from the government. Every resident has been exhorted to view the closest finished road as a concrete illustration of progress and an enduring emblem of expansion that will help a lot of people. Such novel viewpoints are presented in the hope that they may empower local residents of rural areas to control the highways that link their communities to the rest of the world. The actual situation is different, though. There is no discernible sense of ownership or pride among the locals towards the rural roads.
Moreover, a number of additional development projects have been put on hold due to a lack of funding. Even the construction of a road has become significant under the current administration, let alone large irrigation projects and infrastructure. People are therefore sceptical of the state government’s extravagant claims.
At a meeting of legislators, convened to ensure that the ruling party would grab 100% seats in the next elections to the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly, Jagan stated that people should be told to ‘ignore’ the ‘propaganda’ of opposition members.”Don’t think about the roads and other works. Set aside those things and do not believe those untruths being highlighted by the Opposition.You have to think about only one thing: whether your family or any member of your family got benefited by the government headed by Jagan anna (brother)”.
This kind of single-track mind is what the government wants from the sizeable number of people who had benefited from one or more of the welfare schemes.Jagan’s confidence lies in the fact that 87% of the state’s population benefited under various welfare schemes of the present government. It is a different matter that other significant programmes have been relegated mainly due to lack of funds.
It is also possible that this single most important point from the perspective of welfare scheme beneficiaries would influence sizeable sections of voters on the polling day in 2024. Jagan’s claim is that he has been working hard for ‘pressing the button’ to deposit dozens of crores of rupees into the bank accounts of tens of thousands beneficiaries on every occasion. A whopping sum of Rs. 2.47 lakh would have been deposited into the bank accounts of lakhs of beneficiaries by the end of Jagan’s present tenure. He is determined to rule for another three decades. At this point, nobody in his government is thinking about how long this ‘pressing the button’ would continue without impediments.
It is disgusting to witness the alleged disposal of government assets in various districts, unmindful of future generations. A shrewd ruler would consider development and welfare as two of the administration. Jagan, however, appears to have prioritised welfare over development.
Commissioned video clips, in which purported beneficiaries of welfare schemes are questioning Leader of Opposition N. Chandrababu Naidu as to why he had never taken up such welfare schemes during his rule, have no doubt enthused YSRCP cadre. Neither the cadre nor the beneficiaries figuring in the clips seem to be bothered about the large amounts borrowed at very high rates of interests for keeping the welfare schemes afloat.
Discerning people know that their hard-earned money, paid as taxes to the government, ought to be spent judiciously. The current misplaced focus on welfare schemes would cost people heavily in the long run.Nobody in the ruling party appears to be ready to even listen to these factors causing pain to those who are not direct beneficiaries of the Jagan government’s plethora of welfare schemes.
The Jagan government is smug that it would get another term to rule on the strength of its welfare schemes. What if people do not think about speedy completion of the Polavaram project? Where is the need for high-quality roads in villages where people are fine with cosmetic changes?
The Polavaram project, which is thought to be the state’s lifeblood and has the capacity to serve the demands of every region, requires roughly Rs. 53,000 crore to come to reality. The AP government has nevertheless been depending on the Union government to release the funds. Under its welfare programmes, the same government has paid out Rs. 1.37 lakh crore via DBT. The unbalanced priorities of the AP government are exposed by this disparity in thinking. #hydnews #hyderabadlive #KhabarLive
