The Jaganmohan Reddy Government with its misguided policies is driving away investors from the State and the latest example is the decision of the Singapore consortium to withdraw from the Amaravati project, according to N. Chandrababu Naidu, the former Chief Minister.

In a teleconference with his party workers on Wednesday, the former CM said his Government had designed the start-up area development project in Amaravati as a self-financing one, with very limited investment from the State Government, and the Singapore consortium had come forward and an agreement was signed. "Citing lame excuses and making false, baseless allegations, the present Government has driven away the consortium and also other multi-lateral lending agencies. It has ruined Amaravati," he lamented.

In a tweet, his son and former IT minister, N. Lokesh, repeated the charge. Rebutting the allegations, State Municipal Administration Minister B. Satyanarayana said at a media conference on Wednesday that "the father-son duo is indulging in a vicious smear campaign against our Government. In fact, the honourable ex-CM and his son do not even have the patience to read through the press release issued by the Singapore Government. It was clearly stated in the release that Singapore companies are still keen to invest in Andhra Pradesh and depending on the priorities of the present Government they would be willing to invest here."

He reiterated that the present Government did not ask the Singapore consortium to withdraw from the project. "We only asked certain searching questions about the project, to which we did not get satisfactory replies. With mutual consent, we terminated the agreement."

Published on November 13, 2019