Harish Rao says site visit condition was for CHP plants in BRS rule

HYDERABAD

Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) MLA and former Minister T. Harish Rao alleged that Deputy Chief Minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka has utilised his political experience to save Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy in the Singareni overburden tenders ‘scam’ and the latter’s efforts to help his relative to get the contracts.

At a press conference, he said the selective mentioning of the contents in the documents shown by Mr. Vikramarka at a press conference was similar to the misleading statements of the Chief Minister in and outside the Assembly on irrigation project aspects.

He alleged that Mr. Vikramarka had exhibited some documents pertaining to the site visit certification condition in tenders of various Central and State public sector undertakings, other States and educational institutions of the Ministry of Defence and Education. However, he had not read out the portions specifying the purposes for which the condition was specified, and certainly it was not for overburden removal in mines, he noted.

Reacting to Mr. Vikramarka’s allegation that site visit certification condition was introduced when the BRS was in power in 2018 itself, Mr. Harish Rao said it was introduced only for coal handling plants (CHPs) and not for the overburden removal works. The Deputy CM was also silent on the solar power tenders in Singareni, he noted.

Further Mr. Harish Rao explained that the diesel cost condition was only specified for Naini tenders since Singareni had no network there. Even the OB tenders called in January 2025 the contracts awarded for lesser rates than the estimates prepared by Singareni. But, from May 2025 they were going for higher rates due to the site visit condition, causing loss to Singareni. He questioned why the price bid opening was postponed seven times for Srirampur OB tenders.

Mr. Harish Rao insisted on CBI inquiry as the inquiry by the State government agency would not help since the accused is the State government. He said the coal allegations had ignited the process to end the Congress rule in Telangana.