Anti-BRS youth yatra gets rousing response in rural districts

Hyderabad: A bus yatra undertaken by the youth to create awareness among unemployed counterparts to vote for a government that would fulfil their aspirations is eliciting a good response at street corner meetings in villages.

On the second day of the yatra, on Thursday, villagers showered flowers on the group when the yatra went past Patancheru, Zaheerabad, and Parigi before halting for the night in Kondangal.

At a street corner meeting in Sangareddy earlier in the day, the yatra stopped for almost an hour, during which students sang songs about how the BRS government failed to provide jobs to them during its 10-year rule.

Yatra coordinator Indra Prasad Naik said they were giving advance information to youth through WhatsApp groups and the Telegram app about their tour schedule. As and when information was posted in the groups, there was a massive response confirming participation in street corner meetings.

He said that as many as two lakh youths joined their social media groups and one of their chief agendas was to “teach the BRS government a fitting lesson” over its failure to properly conduct the TSPSC examinations.

Naik charged the BRS will failing to fill up vacancies in government departments since 2014, adding their yatra was supported by the Congress, which promised to fill two lakh jobs if elected to form the government.

“Our main demand is to scrap TSPSC and set up a new commission to render justice to unemployed youth,” he said.

Recalling that the separate Telangana agitation was for “water (neelu), funds (nidhulu) and jobs (niyamakalu),” he said: “But for the last 10 years, the ruling party failed to fill up the vacancies in various government departments and rendered lakhs of youth jobless.”

He said the yatra, which started from Gun Park on Wednesday, would cover districts in north and south Telangana before reaching the city on November 27. A massive public meeting with the youth would be organised in the city to mark the culmination of the yatra.

K. Sravanthi, a job aspirant, said the youth suffered a lot because of the inept handling of the TSPSC. “How can TSPSC conduct a recruitment exam when the main persons allegedly involved in the question paper leak case are still working on it?” Sravanthi, a native of Nagarkurnool, said, emphasising that the youth would not extend support to the ruling party in the elections.