The Andhra Pradesh cabinet meeting was held on Thursday. Several key decisions were taken during the meeting. Nara Lokesh, who is currently on a foreign tour, skipped the meeting. It is understandable that he did not attend the cabinet meeting because he was abroad. But the very next morning, i.e., Friday, he landed in Vizag. The reason was the foundation-stone-laying ceremony for new buildings of Cognizant, a leading IT company, along with a total of nine IT and IT-related companies. Observing this, critics are saying that even cabinet meetings have started appearing like some kind of family affair. Nara Lokesh recently returned from his tours in the United States and Canada.
But it is not as if he went there to sign any agreements, which might justify his absence. Nara Lokesh met representatives of several companies during his trip. Some TDP circles are commenting that it does not send a good signal for someone who is being promoted as a future leader to skip a cabinet meeting and then participate in another programme the very next day. If a minister skips a cabinet meeting in an emergency situation, no one takes it seriously. But for routine foreign trips, schedules must be planned in such a way that they do not clash with cabinet meetings. Skipping the cabinet meeting and then immediately attending another programme is not the right practice, say even ruling party circles. It is known that the Andhra Pradesh government has allotted land at low prices to several major IT companies in Vizag over the past few months.
This includes real estate companies like Sathva as well. Sathva plans to develop some IT space on the land allotted to them and develop the remaining land into residential space and sell it. It is known that Chandrababu Naidu on one side and Nara Lokesh on the other are heavily promoting that huge investments are coming into the state because they are offering lands at nominal prices in a city like Vizag along with several concessions requested by the companies.