Vijayawada: Massive rally marks one year of agitation

Vijayawada: A massive rally was taken out to mark the completion of one year of agitation demanding continuation of Amaravati as the capital city for Andhra Pradesh, here on Tuesday.

The activists of the Amaravati Parirakshana Samiti along with the activists of various political parties, people's organisations, trade unions, students, farmers of Amaravati region, women's organisations and members of the women's joint action committee for Amaravati participated in the rally.

Activists of TDP, Congress, Janasena, CPI, CPM, Aam Admi party, Bahujana Samajvadi Party and others also participated in the rally.

They raised slogans "Jai Amaravati- Save Amaravati' in favour of Amaravati capital city for the bright future of our youth. Several thousands of people of all ages right from youth the elderly persons participated in the rally.

Addressing the gathering, A Siva Reddy and G Tirupati Rao, conveners of the JAC of Amaravati Parirakshana Samiti said that the response from the people was overwhelming. They asked Chief Minister Jagan Mohan Reddy to open his eyes even now and continue the capital city at Amaravati. They asserted that the agitation would not stop until Amaravati was announced as the only capital city. They said that there would be a massive public meeting at Uddhandarayunipalem on December 17 where Prime Minister Narendra Modi had laid the foundation stone for the capital city.

Former MLA Vangaveeti Radhakrishna said that Amaravati was unanimously selected as the capital city and several companies and educational institutions also set up their units there for the development of the city. He took exception to the unilateral decision of the Chief Minister in favour of three capital cities.

Former MLA Bode Prasad, Farmers' JAC convener Puvvada Sudhakar, former Minister Devineni Umamaheswara Rao, MLA Gadde Rammohan, Congress leader Sunkara Padmasri, Left leaders P Durga Bhavani, Akkineni Vanaja, former MLA Tangirala Saumya, Janasena leader Potina Mahesh, Dalit Bahujana leader Melam Bhagya Rao, TDP leader Kesineni Swetha, TDP senior leader Nettem Raghuram, Devineni Chandu and people from all over the State participated in the protest.