Munugode bypoll: Ahead of the Munugode poll, after the TRS has earnestly taken up the issue of imposing Goods and Services Tax (GST) on handloom products, another jolt awaits BJP as party leader and former Rajya Sabha MP Rapolu Ananda Bhaskar, who belongs to the weavers’ community, has quit the party to join TRS. The BJP has hit back at Telangana Textile Minister KT Rama Rao alleging that he had proposed to the Centre to impose five per cent GST on handloom products.
Bhaskar belongs to the Padmashali or weaving community and has opposed the imposition of the GST on handloom weavers. He met Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao on Sunday at Pragathi Bhavan. The former MP also appreciated the measures taken by the chief minister for the welfare of the weaving community. This will be the fourth party leader to join the TRS after quitting the BJP.
Meanwhile, state BJP president Bandi Sanjay Kumar claimed that it was Telangana Textile Minister KT Rama Rao who had urged the Centre to implement the GST on the handloom sector. He played some clips featuring KTR who spoke out against the multiple slabs of the GST in the handloom sector instead of a single slab. The BJP state president also wondered why the sarees distributed by the state government during the local festivals were woven in power looms instead of handloom.
Bandi Sanjay also took to Twitter to mock the minister calling him “Drama Rao” and said: “Memory loss is also one of the signs of ageing.”
Rao had urged the Centre to abolish the five per cent GST on handloom products arguing that it has sounded the death knell for the industry crippled by the pandemic. He had initiated a postcard protest as well as an online petition urging Prime Minister Modi to roll back the task pointing out that it was the first government to levy tax on handloom products.
After an attack on the Congress candidate in Munugode, Congress state chief Revanth Reddy has written an open letter to party cadres accusing the TRS and the BJP of conspiring together to defeat the Congress at Munugode. He alleged that the BJP was misusing the CRPF and Election Commission and deplored the attack on party candidate Palvai Sravathi during a road show by BJP supporters.
He urged Congress workers across the states to converge at Munugode and rued that “leaders who rose to fame and new political heights have betrayed us,” in a reference to the Komatireddy brothers.