Fasting is actually a powerful weapon for a leader to get his demands fulfilled. Right from Mahatma Gandhi to Potti Sreeramulu, several leaders took up fasting for specific objectives.
Even Telangana Rashtra Samithi president K Chandrasekhar Rao took up fast unto death (though it was not truly a fast in real sense) and caught the nation-wide attention, forcing the Congress high command to announce the commencement of process for formation of separate Telangana state.
But, the Telugu Desam Party leaders have reduced this powerful programme into a farcical exercise.
The recent 11-day fasting undertaken by TDP MP C M Ramesh demanding establishment of a steel plant at Kadapa had become a ridiculous exercise, as he did not show any kind of weakness either in his face or the body.
BJP MLA P Vishnu Kumar Raju went to the extent of saying that the indefinite fast of Ramesh should be entered into the Guinness Book of Records, as the MP, who was a known diabetic patient, survived for 11 days without losing any weight.
“His health parameters too were very good despite days of fasting. Such fake fasts will make the people lose faith in both politicians and their actions,” he said.
In fact, the comments made by the TDP MPs in Delhi that the fasting was good exercise to reduce weight have become controversial and they proved that the party leaders are treating it as weight reduction exercise rather than a weapon to achieve the demands.
On Wednesday, the TDP MPs once again took up day-long fasting at Visakhapatnam to highlight the demand for a separate railway zone at Vizag.
Since they already made fun of themselves, nobody is taking it up seriously and is treating it as yet another weight-reduction exercise by the MPs.
The YSR Congress party ridiculed the MPs’ fasting saying the deekshas of TDP have been like a drama involving lot of theatrics and the troupe has now shifted to Vizag to enact one more scene which lacks sincerity.
