A section of leaders and workers of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Telangana’s Nizamabad district staged a protest against their own party MP Arvind Dharampuri on Monday, July 31, alleging that he favoured his own followers while appointing presidents to the party’s mandal units. Dozens of protestors gathered outside the BJP’s Nizamabad district unit office, raising slogans against the MP. They were carrying ‘save BJP’ placards. BJP leaders and workers from Armoor, Bodhan, Balkonda and other parts of the district participated in the protest against the Nizamabad MP. They sat on the road in front of the party office in the town and raised slogans of ‘Arvind down down’.

This is the second time that leaders unhappy with Arvind have staged a protest against him. On July 26, around 100 party leaders from various mandals of the district held a flash protest at the BJP state headquarters in Hyderabad. BJP leaders from four Assembly constituencies participated in the protest. They alleged that the MP had his followers appointed as presidents of 13 mandal BJP units by replacing long-time and sincere party workers. They demanded the party leadership to take action against Arvind. 

The protesters had squatted in the entrance lobby of the party office and shouted slogans against Arvind. They later met state BJP president G Kishan Reddy and conveyed their grievances. However, Kishan Reddy pulled up the party leaders for staging protest and told them such activity will not be tolerated. He told them that any issue can be communicated to the party leadership which will look into it and take appropriate action.

It was on July 24 that Arvind had tweeted about the appointment of new BJP presidents for 13 mandals in Nizamabad district, evoking strong protest from a section of leaders. Following the protest, the MP stated that he had nothing to do with the appointments. He stated that the appointments were made by the district party leadership.