Vijayawada: The government has landed in a soup following the high-handed behaviour of TD leaders with the transport commissioner, in the presence of two officers of the transport department, on Saturday at Vijayawada.
The reaction to the incident prompted TD MP Kesineni Srinivas popularly known as “Nani” and MLA Bonda Uma Maheswara Rao to meet the commissioner and apologise.
The MP added that the party was important to him and if necessary he was ready to stop his bus service.
It may be recalled that the TD leadership had found fault with YSRC leader Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, when he had a verbal duel with district collector Babu A., at Nandigama, after the fatal accident involving a Diwakar Travels bus.
Saturday’s incident has annoyed Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu, who is expected to face the ire of the opposition in the Assembly on Monday. He summoned the MP and MLA to his residence for an hour-long discussion.
While they were trying to explain the incident, he remonstrated with them and asked them to go and apologise to the commissioner, who was a “sincere officer.” He didn’t want to listen to anything they had to say. So the two had no option but to come out of the CM’s residence and straight away drive over to commissioner Balasubrahmanyam.
The commissioner was told by the Chief Minister to put an end to the controversy, keeping in mind the ongoing Assembly session.
Though the red-faced elected representatives were reluctant to go and meet the commissioner, the party chief’s insistence forced them to do so.
Mr Kesineni Srinivas told this newspaper that the incident happened out of emotions and they didn’t have any ill-feelings towards the commissioner.
However, he stood by his stand on the ‘benami’ operators of Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy. “I will continue my fight against the illegal transport operators like Orange, Komitla and Meghana, who are the ‘benamis’ of Mr Jagan Mohan Reddy,” Mr Srinivas said and added that these operators run 250 out of the 400 unauthorised and illegal bus services.
The ruling party has started their damage control exercise, and asked the party state president to collect data on the YSRC chief’s ‘benamis,’ which may be useful on Monday in the House, to counter the opposition’s attacks.
