Fake ‘Call Letters’ To Unemployed Youth After TDP Job Melas!

Manchikalapudi, Guntur District: Mahesh and Brahmam, who met me during the course of my Padayatra today told me how they felt cheated by the job promises made by top TDP leaders. “Anna, I completed my B. Tech and attended a job Mela which was held by the Telugu Desam at Chilakaluripeta. I was told that I had secured a job with Tech Mahindra after I cleared my interview successfully. They handed me a call letter and I was overjoyed. I went to Hyderabad with this call letter where I was told by the company authorities that it was a fake one.

Later, at a job mela held in Narasaraopeta, I was told that I had been selected by Stonex and was given a call letter again. This time I discovered that there was no such company at that address. My friends also got cheated similarly saying that they had been selected by Wipro, Hitachi and TCS. I am losing precious time and money on account of these callous Telugu Desam leaders who are taking us for a ride. Moreover, our parents were left red-faced later after proudly declaring to everyone in the village that their son had secured a good job. Thousands of educated youth are being cheated thus at job melas being conducted by the TDP.” I could empathise with the anguish expressed by these young men. On the one hand, we find Chandrababu Naidu and his men shouting from rooftops that lakhs of jobs had been generated, and on the other, we see the real picture. Thousands of educated young men are thus being cheated with the false promise of jobs. This is insensitivity beyond description and without a precedent.

Villagers from Kolakaluru met me this afternoon. They were holding bottles with coloured, foul-smelling, contaminated water in their hands. These helpless villagers told me how effluents from the Continental Coffee factory were wreaking havoc in their lives. They vented their fury on the Chandrababu Naidu government for allowing the industrial unit to let its effluents flow into the canal near their village, leading to obnoxious smell, apart from causing serious ground water contamination. They told me that all the bore wells in the village were severely affected and since they had no alternative, they were forced to use this contaminated water for drinking purposes as well. As a result, there was a steep increase in various types of cancer, kidney ailments and arthritis, among other serious health conditions.

“Anna, this factory is backed by the top leaders in the TDP government. When we had briefed Chandrababu Naidu in the past during the course of his Padayatra, he assured us that he would resolve the issue once he came to power. On the contrary, after he assumed office, things got worse. The water is now even more contaminated and even animals have begun to suffer from various health disorders. No one in this government is willing to listen to us or heed our pleas.” I was numb with shock. Is this how apathetic this TDP government is to public health? Are the commercial interests of industrialists more important than the lives of common citizens and public health?

As I proceeded further on my Padayatra, members of an organisation in charge of protecting properties of Evangelical Lutheran Association met me. They told me how Telugu Desam leaders have cast their evil eyes on properties worth crores of rupees held by the Evangelical Lutheran Association, a service organisation. They lamented that the TDP leaders eyed assets of this association which was serving the deprived and the poor selflessly. They took some properties on lease and had not been paying rent for years on end. “No one is willing to listen to us. We also met the Chief minister but nothing came of our efforts,“ they lamented. This was yet another glaring instance of how the Chandrababu Naidu government did not spare anyone in its unbridled greed—land belonging to the poor and needy, schools, hapless Dalits, temples, Waqf properties, church lands—Chandrababu and his men spared nothing!

I have a question for the chief minister—you keep claiming that lakhs of crores of investments have come to the state and that lakhs of jobs have been generated. The youth of the state say, that in reality, they are losing the jobs they have. Isn’t it inhuman to deceive the unemployed youth of the state by making such false claims?