TDP chief’s arrest leaves passengers stranded in south coastal Andhra Pradesh
The Hindu
Tension grips S. Coastal AP after Naidu's arrest; TDP leaders incl. S. Chandramohan Reddy, K. Sridhar Reddy, K. Giridhar Reddy, D.B. Veeranjaneya swamy & N. Balaji placed under house arrest; Bus services disrupted, leaving passengers stranded; TDP to fight case legally & politically; YSRCP Govt. becoming unpopular.
Tension gripped different parts of south coastal Andhra Pradesh in the wake of the arrest of Telugu Desam Party (TDP) national president and former Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu at Nandyal on Saturday.
Scores of TDP leaders including party Polit Bureau member Somireddy Chandramohan Reddy, Nellore Rural MLA Kotamreddy Sridhar Reddy, his brother Kotamreddy Giridhar Reddy and Kondepi MLA Dola Bala Veeranjaneya swamy and Ongole Lok Sabha unit President N. Balaji were placed under house arrest as TDP activists staged protests sporadically across the region. Mr. Sridhar Reddy had a heated argument with the police who entered his house without showing notice for his arrest.
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Bus services to different destinations were disrupted from, among other cities, Nellore and Ongole, leaving a large number of passengers stranded at the bus stations en route.
Limited number of bus services were operated to provide some relief to stranded passengers without entering cities like Guntur and Vijayawada, where the bus services had been withdrawn anticipating trouble. ‘‘Expecting the situation to improve by evening, we will resume more bus services later in the day’‘ Andhra Pradesh Road Transport Corporation Prakasam Regional Manager B.Sudhakar told The Hindu.
Strongly condemning the arrest of the party supremo, Mr. Chandramohan Reddy said it was unfortunate that the YSR Congress Party Government was resorting to ‘‘political vendetta’‘ and disallowing the opposition party to even stage protests by ‘‘misusing’‘ the police force.
“We are judges and therefore, cannot act like Mughals of a bygone era ... the writ courts in the guise of doing justice cannot transcend the barriers of law,” the High Court of Karnataka observed while setting aside an order of a single judge, who in 2016 had extended the lease of a public premises allotted to a physically challenged person to 20 years contrary to 12-year period stipulated in the law.
The High Court of Karnataka on Monday declined to interfere, at present, in the investigation against a Bharatiya Janata Party worker, who is among the accused persons facing charges of circulating obscene clips, related to “morphed” images and videos clips related to Prajwal Revanna, former Hassan MP, in public domain through pen drives and other modes.