Hyderabad, July 22:Chief minister K Rosaiah on Wednesday said TDP president Chandrababu Naidu was trying to ignite passions among the people of AP and Maharashtra and trigger a civil war with his campaign on the Babli project issue.
Stung by the TDP chief’s description of him as an incompetent chief minister, Rosaiah called a media conference to come back on that. Visibly irritated, he said Naidu himself was responsible for the current situation regarding the Babli project. “He was the chief minister when tenders were called for the project. If he was so concerned about the people of our state, he should have acted long ago and stalled the project in the proposal stage itself by exercising legal options. He was a national figure then. He could easily have stopped the project if he really wished to do so. Why didn’t he?” he asked.
The chief minister said Naidu went to Maharashtra despite his request to him to postpone the tour until an all party delegation from AP met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as planned earlier. “We know the Babli project is illegal and we are doing all we can to stop the Maharashtra government. It was the Congress government that went to the Supreme Court and approached the central government to stall the work,” he explained.
–Agencies