Strikes off? Where are the buses?

HYDERABAD: Buses by and large continued to remain off the roads in all of Telangana and much of the state capital on Tuesday notwithstanding the government’s claims of persuading APSRTC employees to end their strike.

Of 10,000 buses owned by the APSRTC in the region, only 1,600 were operated on Tuesday, a day after the transport utility claimed that the strikers had agreed to resume work.

In the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad, only about 1,517 of the utility’s 3,000 buses plied. These included many private buses temporarily leased by the APSRTC.

Services were poorer in the rest of Telangana, with only 116 buses out on the roads in Khammam district, and 8 each in Karimnagar and Nalgonda. The buses that plied were accompanied by heavy police escort. In Karimnagar, one empty hired bus lumbered along in the company of three police four-wheelers and a mini van with Central Reserve Police Force troopers.

Seeing the heavy police presence, passengers balked from boarding the bus.

Police were deployed in large numbers at bus stations and depots in the wake of the pro-Telangana faction of RTC’s National Mazdoor Union (NMU) vowing to continue the agitation despite the statelevel union leaders striking a deal with the state government Monday.

Tension prevailed at depots across Telangana as APSRTC staff obstructed buses from coming out.

Several Telangana Joint Action (TJAC) leaders along with 200 APSRTC union members were arrested for violating prohibitory orders. E Ashwathama Reddy, convener of the pro-strike faction, the Telangana NMU Forum, alleged that the government was using strong arm tactics to break the strike.

Rail Roko Postponed

HYDERABAD: The Telangana Joint Action Committee (TJAC) has once again postponed its rail roko to Oct. 15-17.

The 72-hour rail blockade was to have begun on Wednesday. Although the TJAC said the postponement was in view of the Banswada bypoll on Oct.

13, sources said the agitation leaders anticipate that the Centre is poised to declare its mind on the Telangana any time.