Andhra Pradesh went through yet another day of bandh on Monday; this time in Andhra and Rayalseema regions, following the call given by various groups opposing statehood to Telangana.
As usual, thousands of buses went off the roads, while shops, business establishments, banks, petrol pumps, cinema halls and educational institutions remained closed. The anti-Telangana agitators, apparently, wanted to bring pressure on their leaders to stall the process of Telangana formation at the meeting to be convened by Home Minister P Chidambaram in New Delhi on Tuesday.
This is the sixth bandh called by the pro- and anti-Telangana forces since the revival of the agitation for separate state on November 29. Andhra and Rayalaseema had witnessed a series of shutdowns and protests from Dec 9 when the centre announced that the process for formation of Telangana state would be initiated. The announcement followed 11 days of protests in Telangana. And the people in both the regions are obviously sick of these bandhs, as it hit their livelihood hard. Their incomes have fallen down rapidly and the revenues to the government took a major beating. To say precisely, life has come to a standstill.
Secondly, the people are fed up with these Joint Action Committees (JACs) also. One would find the JACs forming everywhere – JAC of political parties, JAC of students, JAC of employees, JAC of advocates, JAC of muslim organisations and JAC of women employees, too. It is very difficult for the people to remember which JAC is giving call for which agitation. And then these fast-unto-deaths by political leaders and other agitators have also become a big farce. It started with KCR, followed up by Lagadapati Rajagopal and other leaders and then students in both the regions. Nobody has a clue whether these fasts are real ones, as the agitators continue them for some time, get arrested and admitted to hospitals, where they give up fast. What is the fun of protesting for the sake of it?
