Hyderabad Municipal Election : PM visit to Bharat Biotech facility a poll gimmick, says TRS

Hyderabad: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the Bharat Biotech facility on Saturday was to draw political mileage for the BJP in the Greater Hyderabad municipal elections, said Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) Working President K. T. Rama Rao on Sunday. He said people of Hyderabad know that the Prime Minister’s visit definitely had political overtures.
“People are smart. Don’t think they are so innocent. People are watching everything. People are understanding their desperation,” said Rama Rao, a day after Modi visited Bharat Biotech facility as part of a three city tour to take stock of the development of vaccine for Covid-19.

“Mr Modi came for the second time in six years and that too exactly two days before the elections. People understand it,” he told a select group of journalists hours before the campaigning for Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) election was to end.

KTR, as the TRS leader is popularly known, said that the BJP remembers the vaccine when it comes to elections in Bihar or in Greater Hyderabad.KTR, who is also the Minister for Industry, Information Technology, Municipal Administration and Urban Development, recalled that he had visited Bharat Biotech three months ago.

“In fact Bharat Biotech, Biological E and Indian Immunologicals all had clearly said that no Central government official has even spoken to them about the vaccine development and distribution,” he said.

The minister said the PM’s visit reaffirms and endorses that Hyderabad is the vaccine capital of the world and that the TRS government supported expansion of the life sciences ecosystem in Hyderabad. “His visit is a testimony to the good work being done here.”

The TRS leader, who is son of TRS president and Chief Minister K. Chandrasekar Rao, found fault with the PM for conveying to the Chief Minister that he need not come to the airport to receive him.

“I don’t want to lower the repute of the institution of the Prime Minister but there are some courtesies and traditions you have to follow as they are for the good of institutions and in the larger interest of the nation,” he said.

“The Chief Minister was ready to go and welcome. What was the harm in it. They lowered their own dignity. We have not lost anything,” he added.