Hyderabad: BC Welfare Minister Ponnam Prabhakar strongly criticised former Chief Minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao for his remarks during the BRS Silver Jubilee public meeting in Warangal, demanding that KCR withdraw his comments branding Congress rule as villainous.
Speaking to the media, Ponnam Prabhakar said that KCR very well knew that no one except Sonia Gandhi could have granted Telangana statehood. “KCR himself is aware that without Sonia Gandhi’s intervention, Telangana would not have become a reality,” he asserted.
He condemned KCR’s attempt to blame the Congress government and the police for the poor attendance at his meeting. “It is wrong to push the blame onto the Congress government or the police because people did not turn up for your meeting,” Prabhakar said.
Criticising KCR’s insensitivity, he questioned, “Have you ever paid tributes to the people of Telangana who sacrificed their lives during the movement, who gave up their lives for the sake of statehood?”
Highlighting KCR’s autocratic control over the TRS (now BRS), he said, “You were the party president, you led the legislature party — you controlled everything single-handedly.”
Prabhakar also pointed out that due to the low turnout at KCR’s meeting, the former Chief Minister hesitated to even step onto the stage, despite arriving at the venue. “It was because of the empty grounds that KCR, after arriving at the venue, did not come up to the stage for over half an hour,” he observed.