Telangana draws flak for buying 32 luxury cars worth crores amid Covid-19 pandemic: Report

The Telangana government has come under criticism by Opposition parties for buying luxury cars costing Rs 25-30 lakh each for 32 Additional District Collectors of the state amid the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.

Telangana Transport Minister Puvvada Ajay Kumar on Sunday flagged off 32 Kia Carnival cars for each of the 32 Additional District Collectors of the state after Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao inspected it at his residence in Hyderabad, according to a report by NDTV.

Calling it a "criminal splurge" move, the BJP has told that it was done to "appease bureaucrats" in the state.

BJP Spokesperson, Krishna Saagar Rao asked in a Twitter video, "How can Chief Minister Rao justify spending over Rs 11 crore to buy 32 ultra-luxury vehicles?”

"He is indulging in this massive wastage of public money in the middle of a dangerous pandemic, while many poor people are dying of debt burden due to Covid-19 hospitalisation. This decision...is horrendous and unthinkable," he said.

The BJP has also demanded the Telangana Chief Minister to immediately take back the move.

"As such KCR (Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao) has pushed the surplus state of Telangana into a debt trap state with a whopping debt of Rs 40,000 crore. They already have government cars in good condition," Congress Spokesperson D Sravan Kumar said.

He has also alleged that the Telangana Rashtra Samithi government has misused the public’s money to buy these cars for the bureaucrats instead of using it to add more beds in government hospitals and buying buses for public transport.

The Telangana Chief Minister justified the move by saying that these cars are needed by the additional collectors to tour around the entire district to do their duties.

Recently, Finance Minister Harish Rao had mentioned that Telangana went through a massive loss of as much as Rs 4,500 crore due to the Covid-19 lockdown.