The Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee has condemned in strong terms “the unmindful violence that unfolded at Amalapuram over renaming of Konaseema after Dr. B.R. Ambedkar.”
The party leaders, led by their State unit president Sake Sailajanath, staged a demonstration in front of Dr. Ambedkar’s statue at Tummalapalli Kalakshetram here on Thursday. From there, the leaders started in a rally as part of ‘Chalo Amalapuram’ protest, but they were arrested by the police and shifted to the Krishnalanka police station.
Speaking to the media, the Congress president blamed the ruling YSRCP government for the present state of affairs in Amalapuram. He said the YSRCP gave ample scope for the ‘miscreants’ to run amok and said the manner in which the Minister’s house was targeted was raising doubts in the minds of the people. “If a Minister’s house is not safe, think of the plight of the common man,” he said and added that the arson at Amalapuram happened with the tacit support of the YSRCP.
Mr. Sailajanath said the Congress party would organise a roundtable meet on May 29 on the ‘sensitive issue’ which needed to be looked into from different dimensions.
Mr. Sailajanath accused the Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy of resorting to ‘politics of vote’ and warned that insult to Dr. B.R. Ambedkar was an insult to the Constitution of India. Stating that the SCs were being made the scapegoat in the ongoing violence in Amalapuram, he urged the Congress party leaders and cadre to infuse confidence among the innocent victims of the violence.
Besides Mr. Sailajanath, the arrested leaders included the party’s SC Cell chairman K. Vinay Kumar, Krishna district president Borra Kiran, city Congress president N. Narasimha Rao, Narsaraopet district president Alexander Sudhakar, Anantapur district president B. Pratap Reddy, APCC’s RTI wing chairmen P.Y. Kiran Kumar and Mannam Rajasekhar and others.
