YSRCP president Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy on Sunday assured the cable operators that the pole tax would be exempted and a Fibre Grid Act would be put in place once his party was voted to power. On the 218th day of his ‘Praja Sankalpa Yatra,’ he walked from Atchampeta to Unduru village in Samalkot mandal and interacted with a cross-section of people en route. Representatives of the Andhra Pradesh Cable Operators Welfare Association submitted a representation to him on the newly promulgated pole tax.
Mr. Jagan lambasted the State government for levying ₹50 per pole and forcing the operators to remit the tax with the power distribution centres. “There is no point in levying this tax on the operators and our government is going to abolish it,” he said, wondering why the government was not giving a freehand to the operators.
“Unfortunately, the government is trying to take over the entire broadcast system into its hands, so that it would get control over what to telecast. This is not at all a good sign in democracy,” he told them. The representatives brought to his notice the rules of the Fibre Grid and told him that they were doubtful about the norms as the government had brought them into force only to benefit the corporate bigwigs at the cost of the business of small cable operators. Mr. Jagan asked them to wait for the good days in store for them.