Bharat Rashtra Samithi MLA and former finance minister T Harish Rao on Friday described the state budget as a “big lie,” and alleged that the state government failed to honour pre-election promises.
“The document may be longer by 20 pages compared to previous budgets, but there are no proper allocations for the promised schemes,” he told reporters after the budget was announced.
The BRS leader further alleged that the Congress government had cut 300,000 pensions while promising to provide 200,000 new ones. He demanded immediate implementation of the ₹2,500 aid promised to women.
Earlier, BRS MLAs staged a protest demonstration at Gun Park, alleging that the state government had failed to implement its six guarantees.
Meanwhile, state BJP chief N Ramchander Rao said the annual budget presented by deputy chief minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka failed to address people’s demands.
“It spoke grandly about integrated universities and integrated colleges, but in the actual budget allocation, there is no real effort visible to strengthen or improve the education system,” he said.
“It is an attempt to mislead the people of Telangana and was designed only for vote-bank politics,” he added.
Telangana chief minister A Revanth Reddy, however, described the state budget as a “futuristic” blueprint that balances development and welfare, while laying a strong foundation for long-term economic growth
On the financial front, he said that since the government was formed, total borrowings amounted to ₹3.47 lakh crore. Of this, ₹3.30 lakh crore has been utilised towards servicing loans and interest incurred by the previous regime, he said, adding that the government was taking steps to enhance revenue by plugging leakages across departments and was pursuing the release of pending central funds.