Farmers of Amaravati, the capital region of Andhra Pradesh, forced a complete shutdown of the area on Saturday in protest against the proposed shifting of administrative capital to Visakhapatnam and the alleged high-handed behaviour of the police against women protesters on Friday.
Educational institutions, banks and commercial establishments in Amaravati were forced to down their shutters, while the state secretariat at Velagapudi remained closed on account of holiday.
Headed by the Joint Action Committee (JAC), thousands of farmers in 29 villages falling under Amaravati blocked roads and staged dharnas. The protesters put up barricades and prevented police personnel from entering the villages.
The villagers who have been observing a “non-cooperation movement” since Friday, refused to supply even drinking water, tea and snacks to the police personnel and the restaurants remained closed making it difficult to get food.
Shopkeepers bluntly asked the police not to sit on the pavements in front of the shops, let alone provide them chairs, the JAC said.
At Mandadam, the farmers refused to give away to the police vehicles to pass through the village in protest against the alleged lathicharge against agitating women causing injuries to many and illegal arrests of several women. The villagers forced the police to return.
When Deputy Superintendent of Police M Veera Reddy pleaded with the farmers to cooperate with the police, they fell at his feet and asked him to go back. The DSP sprang a surprise by touching the feet of the agitators requesting them to allow the police to do their duty of maintaining law and order but the villagers did not relent.
The JAC claimed that the villagers told the police that they were protesting in a peaceful manner and asked the men in khaki not to create unnecessary tension in the villages. They erected tents on the roads to block traffic, but unlike Friday, the police was restrained on Saturday and did not crack down on the protesters.
The villagers were angry with the report submitted by Boston Consulting Group (BCG), a US-based global consulting firm, to the state government, stating that Amaravati is unfit to be the capital city because of its geographical disadvantages and also cost-intensive plans. It recommended that the entire state administration be shifted from Amaravati to Visakhapatnam.
Chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy had earlier said that his government was considering setting up three capital cities – a legislative capital, an executive capital and a judicial capital for decentralised development of the state.
The previous TDP government of N Chandrababu Naidu had projected Amravati as a world class city but Jagan had made it clear that building Amravati would not be his priority.
