VIJAYAWADA: A meeting organised by Kapu Telaga, Balija Samkshema Samakhya has resolved to form an apolitical Joint Action Committee (JAC) to fight for reservation to Kapu community. The JAC will create awareness among Kapus on reservation necessity and legal issues involved.
Addressing a press conference here on Sunday, former DGP M.V. Bhaskar Rao said there were two options before the government to extend reservation to the Kapus. The government can restore the G.O. 30, which was in force till 1957 and repealed arbitrarily and abruptly. Kapus were listed as Backward Class in that order. The second option was to list them afresh in the BC quota list, he said.
A committee comprising legal experts was studying the issues. Based on its report, the JAC would apprise the government on Kapu quota. The Smart Pulse Survey would give clarity on socio-economic status of the Kapus in the State. The survey findings were expected to give a logical basis to fight for the quota, he said.
Former IAS officer K.V. Rao said that formation of JAC and meeting Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu were immediate tasks. The Kapus quota should be considered a social and not law and order problem, he said.
The former bureaucrats said that their fight should not be construed as a counter to Kapu leader Mudragada Padmanabham’s agitation. He was following his own path, and JAC chose to build pressure on the government through petitions etc., they said.
Noisy dharna
Kakinada Staff Reporter writes:
In response to a call given by the Kapu Joint Action Committee, men and women from the Kapu community staged a dharna at Bhanu Gudi Junction in Kakinada during lunch hour by beating dining plates with spoons and ladles on Sunday.
Leader of JAC Vasireddi Yesudasu said that it was the first phase of the four-phase agitation by the Kapus demanding BC status. Raising slogans against the State government for failing to fulfil its promise of including the Kapus in the BC list, the group demanded that all promises made to the community be fulfilled immediately as already there was a delay of two and a half years.
Mr. Yesudasu said that lakhs of Kapu families from all over the State participated in the novel agitation at their homes.
“We are going to undertake the agitation in a peaceful manner. Though the government is trying to provoke us by using the police force, we are not losing our cool,” he said.
The agitation would culminate next month with a ‘padayatra’ from Ravulapalem to Antarvedi by Kapu leader Mudragada Padmanabham.
