SANGAREDDY: YSR Congress president YS Jaganmohan Reddy faced no opposition from TRS cadres during his visit to Sangareddy on Monday.
It was his second visit to Telangana after Armoor in Nizamabad dstrict.
However, residents of Sangareddy and presspersons faced inconvenience as Jagan’s personal security and fans went overboard.
One of Jagan’s personal security personnel had hit a boy who tried to catch a glimpse of Jagan while he was commiserating with a victim of communal clashes that erupted in the town recently.
The security personnel, local police and Jagan’s fans pushed away people and mediapersons from getting near their leader. At one time, there was some jostling between Jagan’s supporters and the public.
The heavy security cordon around Jagan drew flak from the public. “No political leader, including Opposition leader Chandrababu Naidu, home minister Sabitha Indra Reddy or deputy chief minister Damodar Rajanarasimha, who have Z-plus security, came with such a big convoy to console the victims,” people said.
They wondered whether Jagan came to console the victims or to show off his strength. Jagan’s supporters followed him in about 200 vehicles to Sangareddy.
A majority of them were stalled at Pothireddypalli crossroads but some vehicles reached the old bus station in the town.
Police, who made heavy security arrangements for the visit fearing trouble from separatists and TRS cadres, had trouble in streamlining traffic.
The heavy convoy and the 30-40 minutes Jagan spent speaking to every victim paralysed traffic in the town. It is learnt that one of the police officers even suggested Jagan to cut short his interaction with victims. But Jagan did not heed and he stayed in the town for nearly four hours.
Every Monday is Bazaar Day and so there was heavy traffic on the road at the old bus station.
Meanwhile, pickpockets had a spree. “About Rs 60,000 was stolen from the pockets of YSRC leaders,” a police officer said.