The Telugu Desam Party has repeatedly alleged that the Jagan Mohan Reddy government has engaged in indiscriminate borrowings over the last four years, pushing the state into a debt trap.
Despite regular clarifications from the finance department officials of the Jagan government, the TDP continues to claim that loans have increased abnormally high to fund welfare schemes like Amma Vodi.
Even the pro-TDP media consistently reports stories about the increasing debt burden of the state, with finance minister Buggana Rajendranath Reddy frequently visiting Delhi to request the Centre to remove the borrowing limit.
However, the Central government clarified in Lok Sabha on Monday that the state's borrowings are not as abnormal as projected by the opposition parties.
In fact, the Jagan government has taken a lesser quantum of loans in the last four years compared to the previous five-year TDP regime.
In response to a query raised by Bharat Rashtra Samithi member Nama Nageshwara Rao in Lok Sabha, Union finance minister Nirmala Sitaraman stated that the previous TDP government had taken loans amounting to Rs 2,64,451 crore between 2014 and 2019, while the outstanding loans went up to Rs 4,42,442 crore between 2019 and 2023.
This means the YSRCP government has taken only Rs 1.77 lakh crore loans in the last four years.
"The outstanding debts of Andhra Pradesh by March 2019 were Rs 2,64,451 crore. It went up to Rs 3,07,672 crore in 2019-20, Rs 3,53,021 crore in 2020-21; Rs 3,93,718 crore in 2021=22 and Rs 4,42,442 crore in 2022-23."
The finance minister also gave a clarity on the loans taken in the name of corporations by the Jagan government.
"The AP government has taken Rs 1,931 crore through AP Water Development Corporation, Rs 1158 crore through AP Road Development Corporation; Rs 450 crore through Fisheries Fund; Rs 11.40 crore from Warehousing fund; Rs 616 crore under Micro Irrigation Fund; Rs 6,212 crore through rural infrastructure development fund and Rs 24,311 crore from credit extension federation."
Now, the onus lies on the TDP to explain what evidences it has to allege that the Jagan government had borrowed more than Rs 4 lakh crore in the last four years.