Visakhapatnam, May 5: After the temple entry tussles, the Struggle Committee on Caste Discrimination has now trained its guns on Dalit leaders, who, according to it, have weakened the Dalit movement.

Addressing a dharna at the Collectorate here on Saturday organising secretary of the committee D V Raju asked the Dalits to reprimand Mala Mahanadu leader P V Rao. He said Rao was responsible for the categorisation of the reservations.

He said it was due the agreement reached between the Mala Mahanadu and the State government, that the categorisation of the reservations could be effected in the State. He said the government succeeded in dividing the Dalits over this issue due to which the development of the Dalit community was severely affected.

Prior to 1995, Rs 350 crore were spent annually on 220 schemes for the Schedules Castes and after the categorisation, Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu has scrapped over 200 schemes, he alleged.

The State Finance Corporation has to disburse Rs 2111 crore composite loans to Scheduled Castes since 1995, Raju added. They were not disbursed following the categorisation, he said.

He appealed to the people to participate in the movement against categorisation, privatisation, automation of agriculture, review of Constitution. He also opposed the activities of the Mala Mahanadu saying it was promoting caste discrimination.

Earlier, the protesters demanded that the issue of caste discrimination be discussed at the DDRC meeting, They also appealed to the officials to take stern action against those discriminating against the Dalits.

Three-day Lumbini fest starts

Hyderabad, May 5: The Buddha Jayanti (Lumbini) festival was inaugurated on Saturday by Minister for Tourism Peddi Reddy.

A three-day function is being held at the Necklace Road in this connection. It is being organised by the Ananda Buddha Vihara Trust, the Department of Tourism and the Archaeology Department.

Photographs of early Buddhist excavated sites - in Karimnagar, Khammam, Visakhapatnam, Guntur and Nalgonda districts are also on display .

A mobile exhibition has also been set up by the Salarjung Museum showing the digital photographs of their collections of reproductive paintings of the Ajanta art. These paintings had been commissioned under the Nizam government between 1910 and 1923.

People can also see the relics of the Buddha kept in an enclosed case, which include the tooth, and other materials excavated at the Bavikonda site in Vizag district.