Telangana: BRS pushed SCCL into debt, BJP alleges

Hyderabad: After Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) working president and Telangana IT minister KT Rama Rao called for protests during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Hyderabad on Saturday, BJP MLA Eatala Rajender held that the state government was responsible for the debts incurred by Singereni Collieries Company Limited (SCCL).

While talking to the media at the BJP party office, Rajender questioned chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao on the reduction of the headcount in Singareni after the number of its employees dropped from 63,000 in 2014 to 43,000 employees in 2023.

Criticising the BRS-led state government, Eatala went on to ask, “While the workers in Coal India are getting Rs 930 per day as wages, Singareni workers are getting 430. Who is exploiting the workers?”

“After the amendment of the Mines and Minerals Regulation Act in 2015 that gave leverage to the Telangana government to get coal blocks allocated through Coal India, it failed to apply and secure even one of the four coal blocks directly under its control since 2017,” said Eatala.

Rajender further alleged that the BRS willfully made the Singareni write to the Centre that mining the Tadicherla block wasn’t feasible.

“Genco was allocated the Tadicherla coal block, and it requested Singareni to do the mining. But Singareni was asked to submit that it wasn’t viable,” said Eatala.