The one-day bandh called by the Opposition parties, demanding the sanction of a new railway zone with Visakhapatnam as the headquarters and granting of Special Category Status to the State, evoked mixed response in Visakhapatnam city and in the district, on Saturday.
By 9 a.m. total normalcy was restored both in the district and in the city, with preventive arrest of a number of leaders from various Opposition parties, and the bandh passed of peacefully without any untoward incidents.
Preventive arrests
Even before the leaders of the Opposition parties could gather their volunteers to stage a protest, it was scuttled with their arrests. The focal point of protest was Maddilapalem and a huge contingent of police was strategically placed there.
CPI(M) leaders Ch. Narasinga Rao and Gangarao, CPI leaders J.V. Satyanarayana Murthy and AJ Stalin, YSR Congress leader G. Amarnath, and former MLAs Tynala Vijaya Kumar and M. Vijaya Prasad, and Vamsikrishna and Congress leaders Dronamraju Satyanarayana, Behera Bhaskar Rao and Pedada Ramana Kumari, were all taken into preventive custody at Maddilapalem.
Protestors were also arrested at Jagadamba Junction, NAD Kotha Road, Gajuwaka and Steel Plant area in the city.
The police also had to resort to a mild lathi charge at the CPI(M) office in Kancharapalem, when they had gone to arrest the party workers, including former CPI(M) corporator Eswaraamma.
In the city alone 620 persons were arrested and in the district about 583 persons were arrested.
A majority of the arrests numbering to about 390 were made in Narsipatnam sub-division, informed the Superintendent of Police, Visakhapatnam-rural, Rahul Dev Sharma.
A number of key leaders especially from the CPI(M) were picked around midnight, from areas such as Arilova, Gajuwaka and Steel Plant area.
APSRTC buses were stopped for a few minutes at Maddilapalem, Jagadamba and NAD Junction, but the services were again resumed.
Shops and establishments, cinema halls and private offices remained opened and autos were also seen plying. There was no inconvenience to common man.
Just beginning: CPI(M)
However, speaking to The Hindu after being released, CPI(M) State Secretariat Member Ch. Narasinga Rao said the bandh was just the beginning of a sustained agitation.
“We were protesting against the Central government for the benefit of the State. And squashing our protest by deploying a large number of policemen and making large scale preventive arrests show the double standard of the State government. This will prove to be counter-productive for both the BJP and the TDP,” he said.
