Warangal farmers stage protests against land acquisition

Hyderabad, May 25: Protest by farmers against the proposal to acquire land in 27 villages around Telangana's Warangal city led to huge traffic jam on Hyderabad-Hyderabad highway on Wednesday.

The farmers staged the sit-in on the highway, disrupting traffic for a few hours. The protest was supported by Congress, Left parties, and the BJP.

The farmers were demanding the government to repeal the Government Order (GO) 80 A, under which the Kakatiya Urban Development Authority (KUDA) seeks to take up land pooling for Outer Ring Road (ORR).

Though officials tried to convince the protestors to end the road blockade, the farmers continued the protest. Police arrested the protestors to restore vehicular traffic.

Farmers vowed to continue their protest till the government scraps the GO. Large number of policemen were deployed during the protest to prevent any untoward incident.

Earlier, police took several farmers in preventive custody in undivided Warangal district to foil the highway blockade called by them to demand repeal of GO 80A.

Farmers' Joint Action Committee (JAC) condemned the arrests of farmers. The opposition parties also slammed the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) government for arresting the farmers to stop them from staging a peaceful and democratic protest. Leaders of various opposition parties participated in the protest.

The KUDA proposed to acquire 21,510 acres of the land in 27 villages under eight mandals (blocks) in Warangal, Hanamkonda, and Jangaon districts. The urban body planned to acquire the land through the land pooling system for ORR.

However, the farmers are not ready to part with their land in view of spurt in the value of the land near Warangal city.

Though KUDA has announced that it has deferred the process in view of the opposition from the farmers, the JAC of farmers is demanding that the government repeal the GO.