KIRLAMPUDI (EAST GODAVARI DT) : Fasting Kapu leader Mudragada Padmanabham called off his four-day-old hunger strike along with his wife Padmavathy at about 1.15 pm on Monday after talks for about one-and-a-half hours with a four-member delegation from the government at his residence here.
The Kapu patriarch gave up his agitation after the delegation made a commitment on behalf of the government on four issues.
The Assurances are allocation of `500 crore to the AP State Kapu Welfare and Development Corporation (APSKWDC) for this financial year and `1,000 crore every year from 2016-17 onwards to help the unemployed youth, nomination of Mudragada Padmanabham’s nominee to the board of the corporation, giving direction to the KL Manjunath Commission to complete its study on the socio-economic status of the Kapus within the stipulated time and registtration of cases only against those who are actually involved in the violence at Tuni on Jan 31.
AP TDP president K Kala Venkata Rao and Sports and Labour Minister K Acham Naidu offered lemon juice to Padmanabham after he agreed to the response of the government to his demands. The state government’s emissaries also included legislators Boddu Bhaskara Rama Rao and Thota Trimurthulu.
At about 1.15 p.m, a team of doctors went inside his house, taking lemon juice with them to make him call off his hunger strike. A little later, information trickled out that the leader has called off his agitation.
Padmanabham said it is now the responsibility of Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu to keep his promises. “In fact, I wanted the chief minister to keep his promises made during the election campaign in 2014. I did not ask anything more. I am on agitation because I had to go to the rescue of my castemen most of whom are living in abject poverty,” he said, adding: “I am ready to wash Naidu’s feet if he keeps his promises made to the Kapus.”
Achannaidu and Kala Venkata Rao, speaking to the media, said as sought by Padmanabham, the govt will not register cases against Kapu youths who participated in the agitation at Tuni on Jan 31. CM is committed to the well-being of Kapus and would keep all promises made to them in the party’s manifesto, they said.