Vijayawada: The poor response to Chenetha Iykya Garjana programme attended by Jana Sena chief Pawan Kalyan on Monday has become a hot topic in the state’s political circles.
The meeting, instead of addressing issues of handloom workers or weavers’ issues, highlighted the political agenda of Pawan Kalyan. The programme concluded without any declaration on handloom or weavers’ welfare.
Earlier, the programme was named as Padmashali Garjana by the Andhra Pradesh Padmashali Sadhi-karatha Sangham. In this Garjana, they were supposed to protest for one day to draw the attention of the government, in which Pawan Kalyan was requested to address the issues.
Their main demand was to form an enforcement agency to check that powerlooms do not to produce 11 handloom items, a seat reserved for their community under MLC quota and a Cabinet berth. They even demanded the formation of Weavers’ Corporation for financial assistance and a position in the TTD administrative board.
Pawan changed the programme’s name from Padmashali Garjana to Chenetha Iykya Garjana. Though the organisers had invited 17 other sub-caste people to participate in the programme, no one turned up in the programme.
The programme had witnessed poor response with no attendance. Not many had come from Mangalagiri, which had Padmashali dominance. Police had expected around 20,000 people to attend the programme and had accordingly made security arrangements. A police officer said they had deployed 300 policemen, but there was not much turnout.
Kolanu Krishna, an organising team member, said the government had taken 16 days to give all the needed permission to organise the programme and even warned community leaders not to attend the programme.
Mahender Reddy, Jana Sena vice-president, said, “It is not a public meeting to show the strength and the programme was not organised by the Jana Sena. But Pawan Kalyan, with utmost sincerity, had attended the programme to address weavers’ issues.”
K.A.N. Murthy, president of Padmashali Aikya Pradhikara Vedika, said: “Now with Pawan as our brand ambassador, the political aspirations started blooming. What the TD and YSRC could not do for weavers so far, Pawan Kalyan’s support achieved much more than that. We are satisfied.”
