Telangana burns

Yesterday a kid named Yadaiah immolated himself near OU campus.  Last night he died due to severe burns.  Yadaiah was a class XI student living in Rangareddi district.  He was an orphan. 

Dileep Konatham wrote this yesterday:

Friends:

I write this email with a burning heart and tears rolling down my eyes. I went to Osmania University today morning to cover the Chalo Assembly protest called by students. The situation was tense as thousands of students and police pushed and shoved each other for over 3 hours. A batch of students broke the police cordon and ran towards Vidyanagar. I followed them with my camera. Some of these students were intercepted at Vidyanagar, while a few managed to escape from here too.   The next batch was intercepted at Narayanguda. This is where students scattered into small groups.  I then came home. 

I switched on the television only to see the most ghastly visuals of my life. A youngster named Yadaiah immolated himself at OU gates. The visuals of Yadaiah running like a ball of fire will remain etched in my mind for eternity. It was exactly the place where I was standing barely 30 minutes ago. Yadaiah suffered over 80% injuries and was shifted to Apollo DRDO hospital.

It is shame that while youngsters are sacrificing their lives like this our leaders have shamelessly decided to cheat us yet again.

Each passing day the agony is becoming unbearable.

Telangana is like Yadaiah in many ways.  Telangana burns, from betrayals, from disillusionment, from disenchantment.  Telangana like Yadaiah is orphaned.  Every political leader who has used them for their votes has now abandoned them.  Telangana like Yadaiah stands clueless, leaderless and rudderless. 

In the recent past, every political leader made a beeline to Osmania University and made many promises.  Few weeks ago, all of them took an oath on a dead OU student’s body and swore that they will relinquish their positions for the cause of Telangana.  But now when the time has come to give up their positions, they have abandoned the cause of Telangana and are holding onto their positions on the diktats from their Madams and Babus.

Today, every Telangana person identifies with burning images of Yadaiah.  Today the whole of Telangana is united in grief, is abandoned, and is orphaned.