Towns in Telangana call bandhs to demand their own districts

All-party joint action committees are being set up to organize bandhs to demand districts in the nascent state of Telangana. The people of Telangana are using the bandh call as a tool against chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, who used bandhs as a powerful political weapon during his own statehood movement.

Bandhs were so frequent those days that Rao had to assure the people that that once Telangana was formed, there wouldn’t be any bandh calls, during an agitation against the transfer of some Telangana mandals in the Polavaram project submergence area to Andhra Pradesh. The call was given on May 28, 2014 when he was chief minister-designate.

But these days, every town has plans to observe bandhs.  Various organizations in the town of Sircilla have called on the people to observe a bandh on May 27, demanding district status.

Sircilla Assembly constituency is represented by KT Ramarao, son of chief minister KCR and the second-most influential minister in the cabinet. The people of the town want Ramarao to work to get district status with the same spirit he fought for Telangana.

Bellampally, an important coal belt city, observed its own bandh on Wednesday demanding creation of a new Bellampally district. This is the second shutdown of the area within 10 days with the same demand.

The bandh was called by the traders belonging to the Arya Vysya Yuvajana Sangham and the Arya Vysya Sangham which brought the business activity of the area to a grinding halt.

Among those who expressed solidarity with the agitators were former MLAs Pati Subhadra and A. Sridevi.

The temple town Bhadrachalam observed a two-day bandh demanding separate district with headquarters at Bhadrachalam yesterday at the call given by Zilla Sadhana Samiti.

Its convener, B Rangarao said the district is inhabited predominantly by Tribal and Dalit people. A separate district for them would go a long way in the development of the area.

With headquarters at Bhadrachalam, the district will attract the national and global attention as a centre of pilgrimage, he said.   On May 25, Korutla, an important town in Karimangar district observed a bandh, preceded by Naramapet in Warangal district.

Meanwhile, Congress leaders are planning bandhs in Wanaparthy and Gadwal to demand separate districts.

The Congress wants the government to set up an all-party committee to study the demands of the districts before taking a final view on the new district demarcation.