Centre’s move to keep KCR out of national agri panel draws flak

Hyderabad: The Centre’s move to leave out Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao from a high-powered committee of chief ministers on agriculture has drawn flak from his Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS).
The TRS believes that keeping out KCR, as Rao is popularly known, is a political decision by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government at the Centre.
The party feels that the country could have benefited from KCR’s vision and his ideas in transforming agriculture as the Centre was already replicating his ‘Rythu Bandhu’ scheme to provide investment support to farmers.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday constituted a nine-member committee of Chief Ministers, headed by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, to help transform agriculture by increasing farmers’ income.
The panel — comprising Chief Ministers of Karnataka, Haryana, Arunachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh — has been asked to submit in two months, its report suggesting policy measures to transform agriculture by attracting investments and raising growth in food processing.
Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar and NITI Aayog member Ramesh Chand are also part of the panel.