Nizamabad: MLC Kavitha attacks BJP MP Arvind on Turmeric board vow

Hyderabad: TRS MLC and former Nizamabad MP Kalvakuntla Kavitha on Wednesday attacked sitting Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Nizamabad Lok Sabha member of Parliament (MP) Arvind Dharmapuri on Wednesday for not setting up a turmeric board for farmers as promised. She stated that Arvind had failed to persuade the union government to establish it the district.
Kavitha said that she didn’t speak on the subject for the last three years because she wanted to respect the mandate delivered by the people of Nizamabad, to also give the current MP “time” to do something regarding his promises to farmers from the district. She also cited an RTI reply on the budget allocated with respect to turmeric-producing farmers.
“Mr Arvind, in the last three years could only get our farmers an allocation of Rs 1.92 crore for close to 1 lakh turmeric producing farmers. If you divide it between all of them, it boils down to less than Rs 250. All he did was deceive farmers by distributing a bond paper,” she remarked.
For the year 2020-21, a sum of Rs 1,18,71,000 was allocated out of which Rs 75 lakhs was assistance towards boilers and Rs 43.71 lakhs is for the assistance towards turmeric polishers, said a RIght to Information (RIT) reply that Kavitha cited to back up her claims.
For the year 2021-22, a total of Rs 74.81 lakhs was allocated. Out of that, Rs 39.73 lakhs went towards assistance for boilers, Rs 6.58 lakhs for turmeric polishers, Rs 15 lakhs as assistance towards Silpaulin sheets, Rs 10 lakhs towards assistance for Spices Producers group in the identified cluster and Rs 3.50 lakhs for setting up basic quality testing equipment, the RTI reply stated.
Arvind had promised the farming community in the Nizamabad Lok Sabha constituency in the run-up to the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. He said that if elected as an MP, he would get the turmeric board sanctioned to the district and that he would get proper minimum support prices fixed for both turmeric and red jowar.