Hyderabad: Police on Thursday took Union Minister for Culture and Tourism and Telangana state BJP president G. Kishan Reddy into preventive custody as he was heading to Bata Singaram village near Hyderabad to inspect the construction of double bedroom houses for the poor under a state government scheme.
Kishan Reddy was arrested by the police near Shamshabad Airport on the outskirts of the city.
BJP MLA M. Raghunandan Rao, former MP Konda Vishweshwar Reddy, and other people were also taken into arrest.
The cops stopped the Union minister, MLA, and others as they were heading to Bata Singaram for a planned visit to see the progress of the work at the site. Kishan Reddy took objection to the police action.
The police commissioner of Rachakonda, D.S. Chauhan, informed him that he did not have permission to visit the village and asked the  the BJP leaders to cooperate with the police to maintain the law and order.
Kishan Reddy, Raghunandan Rao and others sat on the road amid the rain. Kishan Reddy clashed with the police commissioner.
Leaders of the BJP said that the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) government has failed to fulfil its promise to build houses for the poor. They wanted to check on the progress of work at Bata Singaram, one of the sites for the housing project.
A group of 60 leaders led by Kishan Reddy had planned to visit the village.
However, the police placed several BJP leaders under house arrest to prevent them from leaving for the village.
The police also detained several more BJP leaders who were en route to Bata Singaram from other places.
D. K. Aruna, MLA Eatala Rajender, former MP Jitehender Reddy, and MLC Ramachandra Rao are among those who have been held under house arrest.
Earlier, Kishan Reddy took to Twitter to condemn the house arrest of his party leaders. “It yet again exposes the tyrannical rule under BRS. High-handedness and muzzling of opposition voice has become the hallmark of KCR govt,” he tweeted.
Kishan Reddy was recently appointed as the president of state BJP in place of Bandi Sanjay Kumar. It was the first protest organised by the party since its new state chief took office.—Inputs from Agencies