Hyderabad: Telangana Rakshana Sena (TRS) chief Kalvakuntla Kavitha was taken into custody by police on Friday, May 22, after she staged a dharna outside the state Secretariat alongside party leaders and farmers, demanding immediate procurement of grain and an end to deductions being levied at procurement centres.
Kavitha, flanked by TRS ranks and scores of farmers, led the sit-in protest at the Secretariat gates, calling on the Congress-led state government to take urgent action on pending grain purchases. Protesters held placards seeking justice for farmers and raised slogans against the government’s handling of the procurement process, alleging that delays and arbitrary deductions were leaving cultivators without fair returns on their produce.
Addressing demonstrators before her detention, Kavitha launched a sharp attack on Chief Minister Revanth Reddy. “The Chief Minister is not bothered by the severe distress faced by farmers in the state. Farmers are in agony as paddy, jowar, and red gram crops are not being procured. It is heartbreaking to see farmers dying at procurement centres. We are staging a dharna at the secretariat demanding that this government come to its senses and do good for the farmers. Procure the farmers’ paddy immediately; do not cheat them,” she said.
Police, present in strength at the site, moved in and forcibly took Kavitha and several TRS leaders and women protesters into custody.
Kavitha launched TRS, which stands for Telangana Rakshana Sena, in April this year after a bitter split from the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS). Since then, the party has trained its focus on farmer-related issues, with grain procurement and land acquisition emerging as central campaign planks against the ruling Congress government.
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