Saplings meant to be planted as part of the Haritha Haaram bear the brunt as the Energy Minister G Jagadish Reddy and other officials leave the venue dropping the programme

Nalgonda: In what comes as an embarrassment to the Telangana government, Minister for Energy G Jagadish Reddy was forced to return without participating in Haritha Haaram programme on the outskirts of Nalgonda town due to protest demonstration of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) employees.

Police personnel trying to prevent agitating MGNREGA activists from blocking Energy Minister G Jagadish Reddy’s (not seen) convoy in Nalgonda on Tuesday

As per the officials schedule, the Minister was supposed to plant sapling on the premises of Technology and Training Development Centre (TTDC) building, which was located near Ramnagar on the outskirts of Nalgonda town.

When the Minister was arriving in his convoy to TTDC, contract employees of District Water Management Agency (DWAMA), who were staging a dharna in front of their office, stopped the convoy of the Minister. They also raised slogans demanding regularisation of their services.  With this, the Minister got down from his vehicle and expressed his anger.

He also rejected the plea of the agitating employees to receive a memorandum of their demand. The police personnel made a vein effort to control the agitating contract employees. The Minister instructed his driver to reverse the vehicle and went back without attending the official programme.

Reacting to it, the agitating employees also raised slogans against the Minister. Speaking on the occasion, the leader of Joint Action Committee of contract and outsourcing employees of Rural Development Department B Sudhakar said it was unfortunate that the Minister was not even interested to receive memorandum from them.

Moreover, the Minister used objectionable language against them and the policemen, who were present there.  Learning about the incident, district collector P Satyanarayana and other officials, who were waiting at TTDC office to receive the Minister, also suddenly returned to Nalgonda without planting the saplings.