Power cuts, trust vote, T stir may rock budget session

The budget session of the State Assembly beginning on Wednesday will be a stormy session for the ruling Congress Government as issues like ongoing power crisis, no-confidence motion and separate Telangana are likely to rock.

The session will commence with Governor E S L Narasimhan's speech addressing the council and the assembly. The BAC (Business Advisory Committee) will meet later to finalize the agenda for the session.

The TRS announced on Monday that it would move the no-confidence motion against Kiran Kumar Reddy Government for not accepting the Telangana formation, despite promise made by Union Ministers. YSRCP MP Mekapati Rajamohan Reddy extended his party's support for the no-trust motion. The two parties have each 17 members of the total strength of 294 members. PCC chief Botsa Satyanarayana on Monday announced that his party has 160-member strength in the assembly while announcing the MLC candidates. But the Congress real strength is 155. It may require at least 147 to win the motion. But, eight Congress MLA raised a banner of revolt against the Congress and four them submitted their resignations to the Speaker, leaving its strength to 147. The total strength of the opposition including 84 members of TDP comes to 136. 

Exuding confidence to win the no-confidence motion, Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy and PCC chief Botsa Satyanarayana came down heavily against the TRS for resorting to anti-people movements. 

Meanwhile, the ongoing power crisis in the state would dominate the session as all the Opposition parties are up in arms against the government. The Opposition parties have been demanding that the government ensure seven-hour uninterrupted power supply to farmers as promised by it. Water availability in the coming summer, farmers' issues are other subjects that are likely to come up prominently. The Congress government would be presenting a special budget for agriculture in the session for the first time, to give a new push to the agriculture sector and for the benefit of farmers. The textile traders launched bandh pressing for their demand of scrapping of VAT. KCR, who supported the traders, fired at the CM for ignoring the ongoing agitation.

-Sakshipost