Former Minister Peddireddi Ramachandra Reddy rubbishes allegations of encroachment of forest land

Former Minister Peddireddi Ramachandra Reddy rubbishes allegations of encroachment of forest land. Terming it as an orchestrated negative campaign by the media house owing allegiance to the TDP, the senior YSRCP leader has threatened to file defamation suit against it for ‘resorting to character assassination and publishing content that is far from truth’.

Former Minister and Punganur MLA Peddireddi Ramachandra Reddy has rubbished the allegations made by a newspaper and a television channel on “grabbing forest land” in Pulicherla mandal of Chittoor district.

Mr. Ramachandra Reddy has called it an “orchestrated negative campaign” as part of the series of onslaughts being made by the media organisations owing allegiance to the ruling Telugu Desam Party (TDP), and has dared the media house to prove its charges.

Addressing the media at his camp office here on Wednesday, Mr. Ramachandra Reddy called it unfortunate on the part of the TDP-friendly media to continuously sling mud on the Opposition leaders, without proving a single charge.

He insisted that the 75 acres of private property had been purchased in 2001. The Director of Settlements had, in 1981, declared the said piece as “not a forest land,” he claimed. The road leading to his estate, though falling in the middle of the forest, had been laid with the permission of the Central government, Mr. Ramachandra Reddy said.

“Based on an appeal for a tar road from the local farmers, the Principal Chief Conservator of Forest (PCCF) forwarded the request to the Centre and got the approval,” he said.

Mr. Ramachandra Reddy said that N. Kiran Kumar Reddy and later N. Chandrababu Naidu, during their respective terms as Chief Minster in the past, had ordered a probe into the same issue, but could not prove anything incriminatory. The case filed in the High Court by a TDP leader was also dismissed as the same property had been shown in the forest gazette as private land in 1968, the YSRCP leader said.

“I was targeted in the past for the fire incident in Madanapalle, where some files got burnt. Even after nine months, nobody could prove my involvement. Then came the allegation on illegal mining of sand worth ₹40,000 crore, and then the smuggling of redsanders to Nepal. No allegation made against me has been proved without an iota of doubt, so far. This is how the media houses try to divert public attention from the failures of the NDA government,” he alleged.