The Central Government’s decision to privatise the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant (VSP) is going to roil Andhra Pradesh, both socially and politically, for a long time to come. This is evident from the kind of attention received by the padayatra, which was organised by the YSRCP to protest against the Centre’s move.
The decision to privatise the plant came as a bolt from the blue for thousands of VSP employees and their families, who felt like their government jobs were no longer secure. To protest against it, the ruling party of the state, the Yuvajana Sramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP) organised a padayatra (walkathon), which was spearheaded by senior leader and Rajya Sabha member V. Vijayasai Reddy and accompanied by scores of YSRCP leaders, supporters and others to oppose the privatization of the steel plant. Reddy called the padayatra a ‘parirakshana porata yatra’, a walkathon for the protection of VSP.
“Our ‘parirakshana porata yatra’ was well-received at Marripalem as it gathered strength and further momentum with more and more people joining in support of its cause to protect our national assets and people’s livelihood,” said Reddy.
APIIC chairperson Roja Selvamani, Anakapalle MLA Gudivada Amaranath, Muttamsetti Srinivas Rao and other YSRCP leaders also joined the 25-km-long padayatra, which started from the Mahatma Gandhi statue at the city’s civic body office, culminating at the entrance of the steel plant, touching a dozen localities en route to gather support. Hundreds of people joined the padayatra in support of VSP employees.
“We would like to thank everyone for their support as we walk in solidarity to protect our national assets and the livelihood of our people,” added the Rajya Sabha MP.
Earlier, he took a dig at Telugu Desam Party (TDP) national president N. Chandrababu Naidu for allegedly asking people to give a missed call for VSP. He ridiculed Naidu, remarking that revolution is not a reality show.