Moving away from protocol, Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao is unlikely to receive and see off Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who will be arriving on a half-day visit to Hyderabad on Saturday.
“The chief minister has asked the minister to receive, accompany and see off the Prime Minister on behalf of the state government. This is the schedule as of now, unless the chief minister changes his mind at the last moment,” an official from Yadav’s staff said.
A statement issued by the chief minister’s office (CMO) said state minister for animal husbandry, fisheries, dairy development and cinematography Talasani Srinivas Yadav has been nominated as the minister-in-waiting to receive and see off the Prime Minister on his arrival and departure during his visit to Hyderabad.
Prime Minister Modi is landing at the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport at Shamshabad at 2.45 pm on Saturday and will travel in a chopper to the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) campus in Patancheru on the outskirts of the city to inaugurate the 50th anniversary celebrations of the institution.
The chief minister, however, will be attending the Sri Ramanujacharya statue unveiling ceremony, along with the Prime Minister, according to a CMO spokesperson.
The development comes in the wake of the latest outburst by the Telangana chief minister against PM Modi, while reacting to the Union Budget-2022 at a press conference on Tuesday.
Making serious comments against the Prime Minister, KCR, as the chief minister is known, called upon the people of the country to throw the Modi government into the Bay of Bengal. He, however, said he would follow the protocol during the Prime Minister’s visit to Hyderabad on February 5.
This is the second time that KCR will not be receiving the Prime Minister as per protocol. On November 28, 2020, too, the Telangana chief minister stayed away from the Prime Minister’s visit to Hyderabad to inspect the Covid-19 vaccine-making facility at Bharat Biotech in Genome Valley.
The PMO had informed the CMO then that KCR would not have to visit the airport to receive PM Modi and only five people including chief secretary Somesh Kumar, Director General of Police M Mahendar Reddy, then Cyberabad Commissioner V C Sajjannar and Medchal District Collector Shweta Mohanty were allowed to receive the Prime Minister.
On January 13 this year, KCR skipped the video conference convened by the PM with CMs of various states and senior officials to review the Covid-19 situation. Instead, he deputed health minister T Harish Rao and chief secretary Somesh Kumar to attend the meeting.
The Telangana police have made elaborate security arrangements for the Prime Minister’s visit to Hyderabad on Saturday, keeping in view the recent unsavoury incident he had to face in Punjab.
Around 7,000 police personnel, including Central teams, are being deployed as part of the security for the PM’s visit. DGP Mahender Reddy on Friday inspected the airport and the two venues where the Prime Minister would be going to oversee the security arrangements.
At the Golden Jubilee celebrations of ICRISAT, the Prime Minister will also inaugurate the Climate Change Research Facility on Plant Protection and ICRISAT’s Rapid Generation Advancement Facility. He will also unveil a specially designed logo of ICRISAT and launch a commemorative stamp issued on the occasion, the official note from ICRISAT said.
