YSR Congress has called for a bandh across the 13 districts of Seemandhra on Wednesday, in protest against the passage of the AP Reorganisation Bill in Lok Sabha on Tuesday.
The party activists took to the streets in Vijayawada city, minutes after the Bill was passed and vented their ire by burning the effigies of Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde on the Bandar Road.
About 10 activists were arrested by the police to thwart further flare up. Another group moved to the Benz Circle and observed a rasta roko and burnt tyres amid anti-Congress slogans.
Vijayawada East Constituency in-charge Vangaveeti Radha pointed out that the Bill was passed in the most undemocratic fashion. “The Congress completely blacked out the live telecast, which was an autocratic move and secondly they suspended all the MPs from Seemandhra region to avoid obstruction to the Bill being tabled,” he said.
The party’s Vijayawada Central Constituency in-charge P. Gowtham Reddy observed that from the very beginning the Congress has been behaving in a tyrannical fashion. “The Congress high command never bothered to take the consensus of Seemandhra people nor has it considered the Sri Krishna Committee report or had considered the majority view of the State Assembly. And on Tuesday, it cut the telecast, so that the people do not see their autocratic moves. All democratic norms are set aside,” he said.
YSRC city convenor Jaleel Khan said the nexus among the Congress, TDP and the BJP has been exposed.
On Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy’s proposed resignation and starting of a new party on Wednesday, Mr. Radha said,
“Hardly, he will make any impact, as he is not a mass leader and he was not able to stop the Bill from being tabled in the Lower House,” he said.
