Chiru’s bid to politicise ‘bitter lift story’ falls flat

The Praja Rajyam chief Chiranjeevi’s, attempt on Wednesday to politicise his “traumatic experience” in a lift in the Vidyut Soudha came a cropper.

Chiranjeevi, while taking part in a debate on the power crisis, told the Assembly how he got stuck in the lift for 20 minutes to drive home the point how difficult life would be without power.

While protesting the inept handling of power supply, he asked the government to understand the plight of people in the state, particularly in villages, who were forced to spend hours with electricity.

However, the major irrigation minister Mr Ponnala Lakshmaiah, ridiculed Chiranjeevi’s rhetoric and said the lift in which the Praja Rajyam chief was travelling got stuck because of overload and not power failure.

All the 18 Praja Rajyam leaders, who went to meet the APTransco chairman entered the lift, which only had a capacity of 10. “It is unfortunate that Mr Chiranjeevi is also trying to politicise issues,” he said.

Later, replying to the debate, Mr Lakshmaiah said that the seven-hour supply to the farm sector could be in more than two spells in a day if power supply worsened.

Because of severe power shortage the government might extend the staggered supply from two spells to four if necessary, he said, adding that demand reached an all time high of 255 million units on March 6.

He also admitted that average load relief, which is power cut in layman’s terms, was 25 million units per day which is 12 per cent of total daily consumption.

The Telugu Desam and Left parties staged a walkout while the Praja Rajyam, the Majlis and the Lok Satta registered protest against the mishandling of the power situation by the government.

Opposition MLAs also asked the government to suspend the controversial

GO Ms 135 which allowed the Independent Power Producers to sell 20 per cent power in the open market.