A group of Telugu Desam activists, including six legislators, staged a dharna outside the chamber of Principal Secretary Energy S.K. Joshi at the Secretariat protesting against the failure of the Telangana Goverenment on the power front.
They squatted in the corridor on being informed that Mr. Joshi had left for a meeting outside though they had taken his prior appointment. The appointment was fixed for 11.30 a.m. but they turned up at 12.15 p.m. Unrelenting in their demand to meet the senior official, the group staged a dharna for over an hour and left.
The demonstration witnessed angry exchanges between TDP legislators and the press corps when the latter asked pointed questions. Deputy legislature party leader A. Revanth Reddy lost his cool saying the reporters behaved like political activists.
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E. Dayakar Rao, legislature party leader, demanded that Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao convene an all-party meeting to discuss the power problems. He dared the government to handover power sector management to the TDP for three months, in which case, the party will ensure seven hour supply to agriculture sector which faced the brunt of the problems. He said the situation was so pathetic that there was not even a Minister to handle the power portfolio.