The opposition Congress in Telangana announced on Wednesday that it will launch an agitation on October 2 to highlight the problem of unemployment in the state.
Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) President A. Revanth Reddy said that ‘Vidyarthi Nirudyoga Jung Siren’ will be undertaken from October 2 to December 9.
As part of the 65-day-long agitation, protests will held in all the universities across the state. Reddy appealed to every student and unemployed persons to participate in the agitation.
He said the party would highlight how the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) ‘betrayed’ the students and the unemployed. He alleged that the TRS government led by Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao, popularly known as KCR, failed to fulfil the dreams of those students and youth who laid down their lives for the Telangana state.
Reddy recalled that in its election manifesto in 2014, the TRS had promised free education from KG to PG and a job for every household. He alleged that after coming to power, KCR shut down 4,368 primary schools in the remote areas of the state, which resulted in the poor getting deprived of education.
Reddy also claimed that the TRS government did not recruit teachers. The government is not releasing funds for fee reimbursement to students and as a result, the poor students are committing suicide.
He also held KCR responsible for the suicides of students.
He recalled that the Congress had introduced free reimbursement to make higher education accessible to the poor. He alleged that due to the negligence by KCR, the dues under fee reimbursement mounted to Rs 4,000 crore.
He pointed out that the TRS government did not even fulfil the promise of paying unemployment allowance, claiming that the government owes Rs 1 lakh to each of the 60 lakh unemployed people in the state.
Claiming that there are 1.9 lakh vacancies in government departments, Reddy said the number of vacancies has gone up as compared to when the Telangana state was formed in 2014.
The announcement of the protest programme came a day after the Election Commission of India declared the schedule for the by-election to the Huzurabad Assembly constituency.
The bypoll will be held on October 30 while the counting of votes will be taken up on November 2.
This will be the second protest programme to be undertaken by the Congress after Reddy took over as the state unit chief in July.
Earlier, the party had undertaken a ‘Dalit Girijan Atmagaurava Dandoora’ programme to highlight how the TRS government ‘betrayed’ Dalits and tribals by going back on the promises made to these sections.
