Sharmila slams Centre over no mention of SCS in Budget]

Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) president YS Sharmila on Tuesday said the Union Budget for fiscal 2024-25 made no mention of the special category status for the state and alleged that the BJP-led NDA government at the Centre has cheated it again.
The opposition YSRCP slammed the Centre and said it gave a ‘zero’ to Andhra Pradesh in the Budget.
Sharmila highlighted that the NDA government promised to honour the commitments made in the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014 but noted that it left the most important of its all special category status (SCS).
“They (Centre) said they will honour bifurcation promises but there was no mention of SCS. Wasn’t SCS the foremost of all. In Tirupati, (Narendra) Modi promised to give special status for 10 years,” she said, addressing a press conference at the Congress office in Vijayawada.
Ridiculing the Rs 15,000 crore funds promised for Andhra Pradesh capital city as pittance, Sharmila said Bihar, ruled by NDA partner JD(U), with just 12 MPs managed to procure higher financial allocations of Rs 26,000 crore.
Urging Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, who is leading the TDP-led government in the state to respond to these developments, she advised him to realise that the saffron party is allegedly deceiving Andhra Pradesh again. Further, she wanted to know about the Visakhapatnam railway zone not getting a mention and demanded that the port city and Vijayawada needed Metro Rail projects.
According to Sharmila, Andhra Pradesh has been repeatedly cheated over the past 10 years and called on Naidu to withdraw support to the BJP at the Centre. Delving on the lack of timelines and financial specifics on some budget commitments to infrastructure, backwards areas and others, the Congress leader said that this was not a budget but a manifesto.