Ashram Inmates Attack J C Diwakar Reddy With Petrol Bombs

Tension prevailed once again in Chinnapolamada village of Tadipatri mandal in Ananthapuram district today.

The problems started on Saturday when some villagers were taking a procession of Ganesh idols for immersion and were passing by the Prabodhananda ashram premises, and had stones pelted at them by inmates of the ashram. The angry locals responded in kind, and violence broke out with the ashram inmates even hurling petrol bombs at the villages and at vehicles. Several people were injured.

A large police force was then posted outside the ashram premises, and yet a large number of villagers gathered to protest there today too, and even tried to make their way into the ashram despite the cops' presence. That led to another stone-throwing war between the villagers and the ashram inmates. Ananthapuram MP and strongman J C Diwakar Reddy tried to fish in troubled waters by coming to the village to support the locals, and his convoy vehicles too were attacked by the ashram inmates.

The police lobbed tear gas shells to quell both sides, and whisked away the MP to the Tadipatri police station. The MP then sat on a dharna there, protesting the "failure" of the police in taming the ashram inmates. He compared the ashram to Dera Sachcha Saudha, and asked what protection ordinary villagers had when an MP himself was not safe from the residents of the ashram.

The feud between the ashram and the villagers is a few years old.