Way To Protest

The present day politicians have defined the protest as troubling the people and not allowing anyone to do their work. They defined it in such a way that, anything that does not trouble others is not a protest at all. Unfortunately, people also started believing the same.

Recently, I came to know a different way of protesting.

Some time back, the Gopuram of Sri Kalahasthi collapsed, and after that, Government has started a committee to check all the temples and the strength of the structures. The committee has given a report on many ancient temples. For the Gali Gopuram in Mangalagiri, which is the tallest Gopuram in A.P., the committee has given report that, the foundation is not very strong. Then, the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh has sanctioned a bill to demolish the Gali Gopuram and construct a new gopuram in the same place and granted Rs.10.5 crore.

This was objected by many people at Mangalagiri. The Gali Gopuram is popular, mainly because it is an ancient structure. If they are going to demolish it, there is no need to create that Gopuram again. But, if the Gopuram can be protected by any means, then it must do that. The social organizations have consulted few Professors of Civil Engineering to check the feasibility. They suggested few measures by which the Gopuram can be protected with an expenditure of Rs.1 Crore. But, the Government has sanctioned Rs.10.5 Crore to demolish and construct a new Gopuram of the same size. Of course, the amount is no way enough to construct the same.

The social organization in Mangalagiri wanted to protest the government on this. They have conducted drawing competitions to all the students in Mangalagiri in front of the Gali Gopuram. Since, it is also a main area in the town, it attracted lot of crowd, and almost everybody came to know about this issue. The organizers have also conducted signature campaign for this. By the awareness of this in the public and their support, the government came down and withdrew the demolition of the Gopuram.

People must encourage positive ways of protests and strongly oppose negative protests. If we are not going to discourage the negative protests, then it would trouble us only. If we encourage positive protests, it would help us solving our problems easily.

Thanks to Aasara organization and Madiraju Govaradhana Rao for fighting to save Gali Gopuram of Mangalagiri.