Vexed by frequent bandhs and incidents of APSRTC buses being set ablaze during agitations, about 300 engineering students from the city have launched a novel protest to mobilise public support against such general strikes.
As part of their campaign, final year B.Tech students from different colleges took a priest to Mahatma Gandhi Bus Station on Thursday and offered a special puja to buses parked there. The priest recited Vedic hymns, while the students offered flowers to the vehicles.
Police personnel and passengers present there watched this novel event with surprise, even as the students heaped praises on buses for “selflessly and unfailingly meeting needs of the common man” and described buses as incarnations of God.
Winding up the puja, the priest broke coconuts and offered theertham to the students and passengers. The students later garlanded the buses and distributed the prasadam.
The students also told passengers that though “anti-social elements” are involved in organising bandhs and attacks on buses, the student community largely gets the blame. Similar campaigns are planned in other cities of the state, they said.
Final year B.Tech student A.K. Jampanna said, “Our campaign is two-fold: to create awareness among people against bandhs, and fight those who damage buses during agitations. We want to draw people’s attention to the fact that burning or damaging buses will only harm the economy”.