The power crisis and subsequent mounting debts forced a weaver to end his life in Sircilla town on Thursday. Chityala Laxminarasaiah (48) committed suicide by hanging himself at his house.
According to his wife Rama, he had recently borrowed Rs 2 lakh from private moneylenders to perform his elder daughter’s marriage.
He had owned a powerloom till recently, but due to steep hike in yarn and increasing production cost, he had sold his powerloom unit and suffered a loss of Rs 1 lakh.
It is learnt that moneylenders were pressurising him to repay the loans and he found it difficult to do so and hence decided to end his life.
Powerloom weavers staged a protest at the new bus station in Sircilla demanding government to lift power cuts to powerloom units.
Following this, the district collector Smita Sabharwal sent district revenue officer J Sudhakar Rao to Laxminarsaiah’s house, where he announced that the government would pay Rs 5,000 towards funeral expenses and Rs 1.50 lakh as ex-gratia.
Meanwhile, in the evening, TDP legislators lead by Errabelli Dayakar Rao, MLAs Ch Vijayaramana Rao, L Ramana Mandava Venkateshwar Rao, Revuri Prakash Reddy, Mahender Reddy, Jaipal Reddy and MLC Narsi Reddy met the bereaved family members and handed over Rs 10,000 to Rama.
They also announced Rs 1 lakh as exgratia on behalf of the party and promised free education for his daughter on behalf of the NTR trust.
The TDP l e ade r s blamed the state government for the suicide and demanded that uninterrupted power must be supplied for the Sircilla powerloom sector.
Dayakar Rao also demanded registration of a criminal case against chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy for the weaver’s suicide and also demanded that he convene an all-party meeting over power cuts.