Anantapur: The Samaikyandhra agitation reached its 15th consecutive day paralysing all services after NGOs and employees of government organisations came on to the roads on Wednesday.
 
Government services were crippled after the NGOs and RTC employees staged protests at their offices and depots.
 
Nearly, 2500 buses of the Andhra Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation (APSRTC) remained off the roads. Even private operators confined buses to garages in Anantapur, Kurnool and Kadapa districts. 
 
Though, the police tried to run private buses with security the operators refused to ply.
 
Over 1.5 lakh employees have gone on strike and they are demanding the resignations of all elected representatives to mount pressure on the Centre.
 
Normal life came to a standstill with educational institutions, shops and business establishments remaining shut in the three districts.
 
The students’ JAC called a bandh till August 18 and also threatened private colleges and schools with dire consequences if they dared to open.
 
Protests by political activists, students, lawyers, employees, workers, women and other sections of society continued for the 15th day in a row.
 
The protesters burnt the effigies of Sonia Gandhi, Digvijay Singh and K. Chandrasekhar Rao.
 
Rayalaseema JAC convener G. Nagaraju, speaking in front of the ZP office in Anantapur, said the elected representatives were trying to escape from the activists to avoid resigning from their posts.
 
“We’ll attack the houses of the representatives if they fail to quit,” he said.
 
Students from the Sri Krishnadevarya University lodged a complaint against Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at the Bathalapalli police station saying that he was missing.
 
The JAC leaders alleged that the PM was not even in a position to speak over the burning Seemandhra region.
 
Reports said that activists of the NGO Association ransacked many offices when they were opened at Kadapa. They also closed offices forcibly.
 
Students of private institutions took out a mass protest rally accompanied by bands at Kurnool demanding that the state be kept united.
 
YSRC leaders on ‘fast’ mode
 

YSRC MLAs and other representatives are determined to prove their existence in the region through fast unto deaths.
 
Already Rajampeta MLA Sreekanth Reddy and former Kadapa mayor P. Ravindranath Reddy are on hunger stir at the Kadapa collectorate since two days demanding that the Centre should withdraw the decision to bifurcate the state.
 
However, YSRC honorary president Y.S. Vijayalakshmi has decided to stage a hunger stir from August 19 at Vijayawada against the unilateral decision of the Congress.
 
This would be the first protest by a leading political figure apart from the rallies staged by Seemandhra employees against the bifurcation. YSRC MLA Korumutla Sreenivasulu of Railway Kodur will stage a fast unto death from Thursday at Railway Kodur.
 
Sreenivasulu told  media that the Congress and TD were playing the blame game to tarnish the image of YSRC president Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy.
 
“I will go on fast till the Centre reverses the decision on bifurcation,” he said.
 
A large number of YSRC cadre and NGO Association leaders expressed their solidarity with Rajampeta MLA Sreekanth Reddy and former mayor Ravindranath Reddy.
 
All-round support to Samaikyandhra
 

Rajahmundry: The ongoing stir for Samaikyandhra is becoming intense as more number of people from various sections of the society are joining and expressing their solidarity in Godavari districts.
 
In Rajahmundry, Telugu Desam leaders and activists led by its state general secretary Gorantla Butchaiah Choudhary organised ‘vanta varpu’ on the road at Ajad Chowk in Jampeta.
 
Addressing the agitators, Choudhary flayed the legislators from Seemandhra region for enacting a drama on the issue of tendering resignations to their elected posts.
 
He said, “The Congress legislators mortgaged the Telugu pride at the feet of Congress president Sonia Gandhi. If the legislators continue the same trend, they will face the wrath of the people soon.
Women are taking part in vanta varpu fearing the future of their children in case of the state getting bifurcated.  We will continue our stir until the people from Seemandhra get justice. We all with the support from the NGOs will lay siege to the state for 24 hours if the need be and stop trains and buses from plying.”
 
The TD leader was critical against the Congress leadership for allowing the Congress senior leaders like A.K. Antony, Veerappa Moily and Digvijay Singh to handle the sensitive issue of proposed bifurcation of the state as they were no way related to the state.
 
YSR Congress activists Polu Kiran Mohan Reddy and Gurram Goutham have taken up hunger strike near the statue of Dr B.R. Ambedkar at Gokavaram bus stand opposing the proposed bifurcation of the state.
 
YSR Congress MLC Adireddy Appa Rao and other leaders pulled rickshaws from Kotagummam Centre to Gokavaram bus stand while Agriculture employees union planted paddy nurseries in a symbolic manner on the road to protest the bifurcation.
 
Rajahmundry Bar Association members wearing black badges took out a rally and performed Ksheerabhishekam to the statue of Potti Sriramulu .