Any suppression of the Telangana March by the state government may turn a peaceful demonstration into a violent outcry of the oppressed people, warned the leaders of the Telangana Joint Action Committee (TJAC) on Thursday.
They refused to take responsibility for any situation that might arise if the Telangana activists were oppressed in the name of preventive detentions, citing law and order problems.
“We were ready to undertake responsibility and give it in writing, if the permission for the march were given. The government seems to be inclined more towards projecting the march as a law and order problem than allowing it as a peaceful expression of Telangana people,” TJAC chairman Prof M Kodandaram said.
Speaking to the mediapersons here on Thursday, he said they were left with no option but to continue with the march representing a legitimate demand.
“The people are becoming restless as Delhi has not taken any decision. You cannot generalise the entire movement into a violent protest because of some stray incidents,” he said.
Kodandaram accused chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy of siding with few individuals from Seemandhra region. He said if there would be any violence, it would come from the side of the government and not from Telangana votaries. He described the chief minister as inefficient.
“By his statement, one can elicit that he is either not capable of governance or trying to scare people,’’ he said. Mahbub Alam Khan, former chairman of the AP Minorities Commission who had submitted a representation to the President on behalf of eminent personalities of Hyderabad, said the government should allow the march since the people of Telangana want to take it up on the very soil and not elsewhere.
“We the people of Telangana have seen 60 years of co-existence with Andhra people, and have found it unnatural and meaningless,” he said. TJAC co-convener M Lakshamaih said the government deems it fit to give permission to the foreign delegates to stage protest in the name of COP-11, but fails to permit its own citizen to express their demand in a democratic manner.
Rama Melkote, a retired professor of political science, said Telangana movement is now a people’s movement tied up with aspirations of four crore people.