Medaram Jatara: Haritha cottages gates locked over suspicion of explosive materials

Hyderabad: The rift between the Police and Tourism departments has led to the closure of Harita cottages, built for devotees of tribal Goddesses Sammakka and Saralamma at Medaram in Warangal urban district. The police officials claim that on doubts of explosive materials stored inside cottages, they locked the gates.

However, the tourism department says that since the cottages not allotted as per the demand from the police department, they locked the gates of Haritha cottages at Medaram.

Further, the demand for allotment of more cottages is increasing by the day from several departments, said an official at the tourism department.

"The police department senior officials became angry as they didn't get the required number of cottages and started bad propaganda against the tourism department by claiming suspicion over explosive material inside the cottages. On the other hand, the Telangana revenue department is demanding for allotment of all the cottages for their senior officials. There is a competition among employees of several departments to please their higher officials in getting cottage allotment," said the official.

Sammakka-Saralamma jatara held every two years. The TRS government is organising the world's largest tribal event prestigiously and has deployed the officials at Medaram. The Telangana government spends crores of rupees for creating infrastructure and other facilities for devotees. The Telangana Tourism Department constructed Haritha hotel at Medaram and built cottages. Telangana ministers Errabelli Dayakar Rao, Srinivas Goud and Satyavathi Rathod, inaugurated the cottages recently.

Some booked cottages online, but police seized them claiming that explosive materials inside the cottages.

Police officials said that since Medaram is a Maoists-influenced agency area and they were taking security measures ahead of the jatara.

"Generally, we allocate some cottages to the District Collector and SP and remaining for devotees. How can we allocate all the cottages to the police and revenue departments," said an official from the tourism department