Nara Chandrababu Naidu, leader of the opposition, Chief of Telugu Desam Party and ex-Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh has written a letter to the Chief Secretary of the government of Andhra Pradesh, raising concerns over illegal acquisition of lands by the YSRCP government.
It is no secret that the political parties of AP are constantly at war with each other and jump at the opportunity to condemn the other. However, with respect to the illegal acquisition of lands by the YSRCP government, there seems to be a lot of truth to it.
In his letter, CBN stated that the government not only took away the lands of the poor and the downtrodden, but has also purchased marsh and low-lying lands that are now flooded in the Godavari floods. CBN said that there is a huge scam going on with respect to the acquisition of lands, and that there has to be proper investigation made about it.
It has also been stated that the government acquired nearly 600 acres of marsh land in Burugupudi village, for the purpose of giving houses for the poor. These lands have reportedly been bought at an inflated and fake price of Rs. 45 Lakhs per acre, amounting to a total of Rs. 270 Crores. An additional Rs. 250 Crores is required for the filling of these marsh lands with soil, so that they are made viable for construction. Even then, there’s no guarantee that the houses will remain standing for a long time. Naidu has stated that this is a money mining scam that members of the government are indulging in, by raising the stakes to Rs. 500 Crores.
Naidu has stated that apart from the money scam, it is illegal to convert marsh lands and mangrove lands into housing lands, for many reasons including environmental and long life expectancy of the houses built on the land. He said that the poor would be pushed deeper into poverty if they were to occupy these lands, as they would give away in case of heavy floods or any other natural calamities.
Further speaking about the same, Naidu said that Burugupudi village is not the only place where an incident like this has taken place. He said that the same style of ‘modus operandi’ has been put into effect in several places all over the state. He has also named a few of those places: Tenali, Vinukonda, Kavali, Palacole, Pendurthi, Chowdavaram, Addanki and Penamaluru.
Furthermore, CBN requested the Chief Secretary to order a thorough investigation into this matter, which would bring into light a lot more facts about all the discrepancies that are currently happening with respect to illegal land acquisition in Andhra Pradesh.
