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The stage is set for a showdown between the proponents of united Andhra and separate Telangana here on Saturday.
While the Andhra Pradesh Non-Gazetted Officers Association (APNGOs) is going ahead with its plan to hold 'Save Andhra Pradesh' meeting, the pro-Telangana outfits have given a call for a 24-hour bandh to be observed from the midnight of Friday.
On the other hand, the Osmania University Joint Action Committee has given a separate call for blocking all rail and road routes leading to the state capital from Andhra and Rayalaseema (combinedly being called as Seemandhra) regions. The Madiga Reservation Porata Samithi, an organisation of Dalits, had also given a call for Hyderabad bandh on Saturday.
According to the Telangana Joint Action Committee (TJAC) chairman M Kodandaram, the bandh call has been given to protest against the "anti-Telangana attitude" of chief minister, N Kiran Kumar Reddy. He contended that the state government had gone out of the way in granting permission for APNGOs to hold the meeting while at the same time rejecting the application of the TJAC for holding a peace rally on the same day.
Hyderabad police commissioner Anurag Sharma, however, said the permission was given on a first-come, first-served basis. The APNGOs applied for permission on August 20 and other groups applied later.
On their part, the police has decided to keep a close watch on the APNGOs meeting. Sharma said there were 45 platoons AP Special Police and 11 companies of paramilitary forces in the city at present. APNGOs president, Ashok Babu, said it was undemocratic on the part of the Telangana activists to obstruct the meeting, which was expected to be attended by about 50,000 people.
According to reports reaching here, a large number of state government employees from various parts of Seemandhra have made advance arrangement to travel to Hyderabad by trains, buses, vans, cars and other private vehicles to attend the Saturday’s meeting.
Seemandhra has been on the boil ever since the Congress Working Committee took a decision on July 30 to accord separate statehood to the Telangana region with Hyderabad as its capital.
On Friday, advocates belonging to Seemandhra and Telangana clashed at the state high court premises over the bifurcation issue.
