The two-day bandh call given by the Telangana political joint action committee starting today severely affected public transport and retail businesses across the ten districts of the Telangana region, including the city of Hyderabad.
Hundreds of RTC buses remained in depots while shops and establishments, petrol bunks and cinema theatres remained closed for the day. South Central Railway cancelled the local MMTS train services on the Secunderabad-Falaknuma route in the city for the second day today.
Police made precautionary arrests at several places besides taking into custody a couple of TRS leaders in the city as they took out a rally in support of the bandh in the morning. Clashes between students and police forces at Osmania University continued on Tuesday. However, the bandh was peaceful.
Meanwhile, chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy appealed to the Opposition members to restore normality in the Assembly and outside stating that the issue of separate statehood could only be decided by the Centre.
The Assembly witnessed similar scenes as on Monday with TRS and Telangana members of TDP staging non-stop protest on the floor of the House in support of their demand.
Speaking on the motion of thanks to the Governor for his address on Tuesday, the chief minister urged the Opposition members to cooperate with the government in attending to the issues of people.
“If you do not cooperate, you will remain in the Opposition for the third consecutive time,” he told the TDP while stating that he would abide by whatever decision was taken on the Telangana issue by the Centre. Deputy speaker N Manohar got the motion approved by voice vote as soon as the chief minister ended his brief address amid slogan shouting by Telangana members.
TDP president N Chandrababu Naidu blamed the Centre for the present state of affairs and asked the government to clear the air on the Telangana issue at the earliest.
