It is now more or less confirmed that former Indian cricketer Ambati Rayudu, who started his political innings quietly a few days ago, is all set to join the ruling YSR Congress party.
He has already met party president and chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy and during his ongoing tour to different parts of Guntur district, he has been heaping praises on the chief minister for his welfare programmes.
Hitherto, Rayudu has not made any criticism against the political rivals of YSRC. But on Tuesday, he began changing his gears to bat aggressively.
The first attack he has made was on power star and Jana Sena Party chief Pawan Kalyan, who incidentally belongs to his own Kapu community.
The cricketer took Pawan Kalyan to task for the latter’s comments against village volunteers, accusing them of indulging in large scale corruption and also involved in women trafficking.
Rayugu, who went to a school in Guntur district to study the education system there and the facilities available to the students, found fault with Pawan Kalyan for making nasty comments against village volunteers.
“The concept of village volunteers is a role model for the entire nation. Such a system is not there in any other state in the country. It is a flagship programme of the state government,” he said.
Stating that it is because of village volunteer system that the state has been witnessing development which could not be seen in the last 60-70 years, Rayudu said the village volunteers were playing a key role in ensuring that every rupee the government was spending was reaching the common man.
“It is a great thought to introduce such a system. It has reformed the village-level governance. The benefits of the government schemes are directly reaching the common people due to village volunteers. During the Covid-19 pandemic, they did remarkable service to the people,” Rayudu said.
He asked the people not to give any importance to the comments made by some leaders, who are only trying to sling mud at the government which is doing good for the people.
