Showdown today

• Capital city is tense with tempers and anxiety
• Thousands taken into preventive custody
• All educational institutions to remain closed
• MMTS trains cancelled; heavy traffic curbs
• Unprecedented police deployment
• Osmania University cancels all exams

Hyderabad: The stage is set for a showdown between the State Government and the Telangana activists. While the TJAC and other pro-Telangana organizations and parties have reiterated their resolve to go ahead with Chalo Assembly scheduled for Friday despite the refusal of the Government to give permission, the police have turned the city into a fortress and imposed unprecedented traffic restrictions and also resorted to large scale preventive arrests. The situation is equally tense all over the region from where large numbers of activists were preparing to move to Hyderabad to make the programme a success.

A multi-layer security cover has been put in place by the police including 58 check posts by the Cyberabad police and 17 check posts by the Hyderabad police at all the entry points into the city to prevent activists from entering the capital. They also cordoned off the Assembly building and the Indira Park area where agitators plan to gather first. Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy who reviewed the situation with officials and senior police officers directed the administration to see that all educational institutions remain closed. The police have asked the general public to avoid the areas where there was a possibility of some trouble and the roads where traffic restrictions would be in force from midnight of Wednesday. The Osmania University has cancelled all the exams to be held on Friday in the university jurisdiction.

Kiran asked the police to show utmost restraint while maintaining law and order situation in the city. He told them that even a single rubber bullet should not be used. Police have been told to see that there was no obstruction in the movement of ambulances and other vehicles which come under the emergency services category.

On the other hand, the TJAC chairman Prof M Kodandaram appealed to the people to gather at Indira Park around 11.30 am from where the Chalo Assembly rally will kick start. He also said that it appears that the government has no control over the police and goes by what the police say and hence he should resign immediately. He also criticized TDP president N Chandrababu Naidu for not making any effort to force the government move a resolution in the Assembly favouring bifurcation of the state.

A delegation of legislators and leaders from TRS, BJP and CPI met the Governor ESL Narasimhan and appealed to him to permit the TJAC programme. He listened to them keenly but did not respond. The above three parties extended their full support to the programme and declared their intention to participate in the same. The TDP also announced its support but will not directly participate in it.

The pro-Telangana students on Wednesday clashed with police on the Osmania University (OU) campus for the second consecutive day, demanding that they be allowed to take out a rally towards the State Assembly. Students pelted police with stones after they were stopped at the NCC gate of the OU campus and the police retaliated by firing teargas shells.