Normal life came to a standstill in 10 districts of Telangana including the State capital Hyderabad as the shutdown called by Telangana Rashtra Samiti chief K Chandrashekar Rao was total and peaceful.
KCR had called for a general strike in protest against the Centre issuing an Ordinance merging seven mandals of Khammam district with neighbouring Seemandhra. These areas were facing submergence under the Polavaram project.
With 4,500 RTC buses across Telangana remaining confined to the depots, hundreds of thousands of passengers were stranded without any public transport. Shops, business establishments, petrol bunks and theaters remain closed. The traffic on the roads was also very thin.
In Hyderabad the two main Imlibun and Jubilee bus stands wore a deserted look. The city buses were off the road too causing immense difficulties to the passengers. A few auto-rickshaws, which plied fleeced the passengers. TRS leaders organised sit-in protest at the RTC bus depots and stations in the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad to stop the buses.
Same was the situation across the region, specially the big towns of Adilabad, Nizamabad, Karimnagar, Medak, Warangal, Mahbubnagar Nalgonda and Khammam.
In Khammam, the ground zero of the entire controversy, the workers of the CPI, CPI(M) and the CPI(Ml) New Democracy also participated in the protest demonstrations and processions.
In Warangal, CPI workers burnt the effigy of the Central Government. In Sangareddy, local MlA Chinta Prabhakar led a bike rally. He demanded a change in the design of Polavaram project. In Nizamabad city, two TRS MlAs Pocharam Srinivas Reddy and Ganesh Gupta led the protest.
TRS general secretary K Keshav Rao said his party would challenge the Ordinance transferring 205 villages of Telangana to Seemandhra. He held the BJP Government at the Centre responsible for the controversy.
Senior Congress leader K Jana Reddy said that the Centre had acted in a hasty manner in issuing the Ordinance. “This shows that the Centre was tilting in favour of one State,” he said. He wondered why the Centre did not wait till new Governments take over in both the States for consultations and taking a decision.
However, the BJP leaders rejected the criticism. Union Minister M Venkaiah Naidu, who hails from Andhra, told the media in New Delhi that the Ordinance on Polavaram was prepared by the previous Government and there was no scope for any controversy over it.
“We are just implementing the decision of the last Government. It is nothing new. Our Government is committed to justice for both the States. Interests of both the States are important to us,” he said.
State BJP president G Kishan Reddy alleged that the TRS was indulging in false propaganda against the Modi Government over Polavaram issue.
“This shows the bankruptcy of the party. We are not opposing the call for bandh but KCR should explain when the resolution on Ordinance was passed. It was not the decision of the NDA Government to transfer the seven mandals of Khammam district facing submergence. Decision was taken by the Congress Government were being attributed to the Modi Government,” he said.
Senior TDP leader from Telangana M Narasimhulu also lashed out at KCR for calling strike and said the TRS leader should remember when was the decision on Polavaram taken. “Why he did not oppose the Bill in the Rajya Sabha,” he asked.
It is shameful that a CM-designate has called strike, he said blaming inefficiency of KCR.