Andhra Pradesh Assembly LIVE: 141 cases in 148 days to stall Mega DSC, alleges Lokesh

Home News India Andhra Pradesh The session is expected to run for four days, to Thursday; Amaravati works, Polavaram, rainfall deficit and farmers' issues are expected to be addressed Updated - August 17, 2026 01:40 pm IST File picture of Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu in the Assembly during a session | Photo Credit: Special arrangement The Monsoon session of the Andhra Pradesh Legislature opened in disorder on Monday (August 17, 2026). The Assembly began at 9 a.m. and the Legislative Council an hour later, both summoned by Governor S. Abdul Nazeer under Article 174(1). This is the Assembly’s seventh session and the Council’s 50th.The Business Advisory Committee, chaired by Speaker Chintakayala Ayyanna Patrudu, is to meet to settle the sitting days and the agenda; the session is expected to run four days, to Thursday, since Varalakshmi Vratam falls on August 21. The government is preparing to introduce seven Bills.In the Council, the YSRCP has pressed for a discussion on the Mega DSC recruitment, the issue behind a fortnight of protests, detentions and arrests across the State. Amaravati works, the Polavaram project, the rainfall deficit and farmers’ issues are expected to take up much of the four days.Follow live updates here:August 17, 2026 13:40 A year on, why the agitation?The recruitment is done, Mr. Lokesh told the House, the teachers trained and already in classrooms, so why raise an agitation a year later? He put the question to Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy directly and offered to argue it out anywhere, in the House or outside.On the substance, he said the government was applying both vertical and horizontal reservation, and doing it in the open.August 17, 2026 13:35 Thirteen DSCs between 1994 and 2019: LokeshMr. Lokesh said the TDP stood for reforms in education, and that 1.8 lakh teachers had been recruited through 13 DSCs during the party’s tenure between 1994 and 2019.He said the coalition government of the TDP, the BJP and the Jana Sena had since held several recruitment examinations.August 17, 2026 13:27 Debate it here, not at press conferences: Lokesh to JaganMr. Lokesh said the government was prepared to answer every allegation about the Mega DSC on the floor of the House, and asked Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy to take up the issue there rather than at press conferences.He also referred to a remark the former Chief Minister had made about himself, saying, “He called himself a cockroach.”August 17, 2026 13:24 Notification was built to survive court scrutinyMr. Lokesh said the notification held up because the department had first studied why earlier recruitment notifications had drawn stays. Officials including Vijayarama Raju, then Commissioner of School Education and now CRDA Commissioner, worked on that exercise, and the reasons were analysed using an AI engine before a model notification was drawn up to avoid the same flaws.He said he had told the department he would act seriously if the notification failed at any stage of legal scrutiny. The coalition government completed the recruitment, issued offer letters, trained the selected teachers and posted them in schools, he said, calling it an achievement of the people’s government. Published - August 17, 2026 01:19 pm IST