Telugu Desam Party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu seems to have learnt a lesson or two from his Telagana counterpart K Chandrasekhar Rao, who returned to power for the second successive term by implementing a string of welfare schemes.
Following KCR’s winning formula of attracting pensioners who voted en masse for the TRS in the recent assembly elections, Naidu has also announced increasing of pensions for the old and widows from Rs 1,000 to Rs 2,000 per month with effect from February.
Addressing the Janma Bhoomi programme in Nellore district on Friday, Naidu announced that the increased pensions would be implemented from January 1.
Each pension holder would be getting Rs 3,000 in February, including one month arrear of January, he said and adding that the increase in pension is being given as a Sankranthi Gift to Andhra People.
The chief minister also introduced another programme on the lines of KCR Kits programme. Calling it as Raksha, he said the scheme would provide free napkins to school going girls across the state.
As many as six lakh girl children across the state would get at least 10 napkins for their needs as part of the programme at free of cost and hence they had named the programme for the safety and dignity of girls.
He welcomed reservations for the poor among the upper castes and sought to know why the Centre had ignored reservations for Kapus which was presented earlier. He also said would also be proposing reservations for fishermen.
Watch out for more sops from Naidu in the coming days, as the elections approach!