Nagpur: All Vidarbhaites and youth supporters, vehemently demanding separation of Vidrabha, will take the oath of struggle and also publicly burn the electricity bills in protest against government apathy in fulfilling their long pending demand, on coming August 1, the birth anniversary day of Freedom Fighter Lokmanya Tilak, a press note issued by Vidarbha Rajya Andolan Samiti () informed.
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The protest morcha will be held at 11 am on August 1, at Variety Square, Sitabuldi, Nagpur, said VRAS president Dilip Narwadia, adding that it was resolved in the executive body meeting of the Samiti held at Giripeth headquarters on July 14, which was presided by core-committee senior member and former Director General of Police Prabirkumar Chakravarty in the prominent presence of economist Dr Srinivas Khandewale, chief convenor Sri Ram Nevale and others.
Dwelling on the need of separation of Vidarbha, members spoke on various issues including generation of electricity which is done in the region, and all required infrastructure, such as, land, water, coal consumed from the region itself, yet the residents of Vidarbha are required to face pollution and scarcity of electricity. Not only this, the electricity to power generating Vidarbha is sold out costlier as it is diverted to Mumbai, Nashik and Pune, the hours of load shedding are not minimized, and many anomalies.
The protests of VRAS also include mass-scale burning of electricity bills on August 1 at various places, dharnas to be organized by the supporters of 6 districts of Vidarbha in front of the office of chief engineer (Electricity Generation) Nagpur on October 2, and similar dharna protest will be staged at the office of chief engineer (Elect) Amravati by supporters of 5 districts.
Also present during the executive body meeting included Dilip Narwadia, Arun Kedar, Bhimrao Fusey, Annaji Rajedhar, Rajesh Shrivastava, Sunil Khandelwal, Dilip Kolhe, Ghanshyam Purohit, Dr Dilip Tirpufe, Prafulla Hadankar, Vasantkumar Chourasia, Raju Deshmukh, Shyamul John and others.
