JOIN USAndhra Pradesh Finance Minister Anam Ramnarayan Reddy on Friday presented a tax-free, revenue-surplus budget for 2012-13 with an overall expenditure of over Rs 1.45 lakh crore.
The Telangana Rashtra Samithi protested against the government announcing any sops after the Election Commission had announced schedule for by-polls. The state government after consulting the state election commission has gone ahead and introduced the budget in the state assembly as scheduled.
The Election Commission on Thursday night announced that by-elections to six vacant seats in Telangana and one in Coastal Andhra will be held on March 18. However, the announcement of the schedule for by-elections to seven Assembly seats has come as a relief for Andhra Pradesh’s ruling Congress as it will now not be facing polls in 24 constituencies in one go as being demanded by the YSR Congress party.
With the Assembly speaker yet to take a decision on the disqualification of 17 Congress rebels, the Election Commission decided to go ahead with the polls for seven other seats which fell vacant last year due to resignations of six members.
The seventh vacancy was caused by the death of an independent legislator.
As anticipated by Opposition parties, the budget was packed with attractive packages for the women, youth and the poor.