Reservations row: Manda Krishna to undertake protest fast from January 1 to 5

HYDERABAD: Soon after his release from the Chanchalguda central prison here, where he was incarcerated for 10 days after arrest, Madiga Reservation Porata Samithi (MRPS) founder Manda Krishna Madiga on Wednesday came down heavily on the state government and announced that he would sit on a protest fast from January 1 to 5 to exert pressure on the state government to prevail upon the Centre to categorise the Scheduled Castes in the state.

“With the support of political parties, student unions and intellectuals, I will undertake a fast. Let the government decide  the place. May it be Bapu Ghat or Indira Park in Hyderabad or any place allotted by the state government. At any cost, I will hold a protest demanding that the state government take up the SC categorisation issue with the Centre,” he said. “Chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao is ruling the state like a tyrant. He is trying to suppress the basic rights of people. Those who are trying to hold protests against the undemocratic policies of the state government are being arrested and sent to jail. By doing so, the chief minister is trying to intimidate the leaders, who are raising people’s issues, and make them call off their protests.”

He said that during the protests held for a separate Telangana state in the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh state, TRS activists resorted to violence and did severe damage to properties, especially during the Million March. In comparison, the protests organised so far by the MRPS either in the united state or in the present state had never turned violent, he claimed. “We just attempted to organise a peaceful protest in Hyderabad ten days ago but were arrested,” said the MRPS founder who was arrested by the police for organising a rally here 10 days ago to demand categorisation of SCs.

Manda Krishna recalled that MRPS activists had supported TRS chief K Chandrasekhar Rao during his 10-day protest fast from November 29 to December 9 in 2013 during the statehood movement. “But chief minister KCR has made me suffer in jail for 10 days,” he remarked.