The “Chenetha dharna” taken up by YSR Congress party honorary president Y S Vijayalakshmi at Siricilla in Karimnagar district to extend solidarity with the weavers’ community ended up being a one-and-a-half-hour public meeting, rather than a “deeksha” or “dharna.”

The public meeting started at around 2.30 pm and ended at around 4 pm. Of this one-and-a-half hour programme, Vijayalakshmi spoke only for about 20 minutes, while the remaining time was consumed by other speakers like K K Mahender Reddy, Raj Singh Thakur and Konda Surekha. And the meeting was disrupted for quite some time by the Telangana activists who threw chappals, eggs and tomatoes on the stage, before they were caned and bundled into police jeeps by the heavily armed security forces.

Vijayamma confined her speech mostly to recalling her husband Y S Rajasekhara Reddy’s rule in which all sections of people were benefited and also to the commitment of her son Y S Jaganmohan Reddy towards fulfilling YSR’s dreams. She made a brief mention about weavers’ issues and ended up her speech saying that the problems of weavers would be solved after Jagan becomes the Chief Minister. She refrained from making any reference to the Telangana statehood demand.

On the other hand, Mahender Reddy and Surekha lashed out the Telangana Rashtra Samithi for creating hurdles to the dharna.

“By successfully organizing the dharna, we have proved that there is a lot of support to YSR Congress party and Jaganmohan Reddy. The days of the TRS are numbered here and the people would chase away KCR and his son K T Rama Rao,” Mahender Reddy said.