On Day 14,Telangana strike reaches Chief Ministers office

Protests in support of Telangana statehood reached the state secretariat the 14th day of the strike with hundreds of employees

Protests in support of Telangana statehood reached the state secretariat on Monday the 14th day of the strike with hundreds of employees raising slogans and participating in traditional dances outside the Chief Ministers Office. Public and private transport remained affected though the state road transport corporation managed to run some buses in the city.

The IT industry also felt the impact of the strike when hundreds of pro-Telangana protesters stormed into offices of IT majors at Hi-Tec and Gachibowli and forced all employees out. Small and medium industrial units in industrial estates in the city,too,were forced to shut down. Employees of AP Transmission Corporation APTRANSCO held protests outside their offices.

Telangana employees disrupted work at the secretariat by blocking roads and entrances to offices,while women employees of the secretariat performed traditional dances outside the CMs office,holding up visitors. The Telangana Rashtra Samiti TRS warned the government against deducting salary of employees on strike,or terminating employees working on contract basis. The Telangana Joint Action Committee gave a call for shutting down close to 2,000 small and medium industries today. The rail roko has been called off after two successful days of protest. So far everything has been peaceful but if anything goes wrong,the responsibility will be on the elected members of Telangana, JAC convenor M Kodandaram said.

All school and educational institutions remained closed. More than 20,000 employees of AP road transport corporation remained on strike and 9,000 buses remained stationed at depots. Kodandaram led a protest of road transport employees at Bus Bhavan,the RTC headquarters,demanding that contract employees who were terminated by the government be reinstated.

The power supply situation in the state remained precarious and the government imposed four-hour cuts in urban and 12-hour cuts in rural areas while declaring a power holiday for a day every week for industries and high tension consumers. Health and sanitation workers of municipalities,however,returned to work.