Andhra Pradesh

Ready for big change

The city looks ready for big change. The fact that big players in the retail market are investing huge amounts to woo the locals to their outlets goes to speak volumes about the big time that lies ahead. Developing an eye for the smallest of the needs of the customer is the key to success today. Why else does one think that the Spencer’s hypermarket, opened at Yalamanchili Complex near Andhra Loyola College in the city, includes a ‘curry point’? Considered a small-time vendor’s job until recently, a ‘curry point’ has now found a place in the plush interiors of the hypermarket, thanks to the extended patronage of the middle class to the ‘list of clientele’ of such hyper markets.

The transport officials did not encounter such a situation previously and, therefore, had no clue as to how to deal with it until they took up the matter with the top police brass. When a vehicle was recently seized in Gudivada for violating transport rules, the public protested against it and the matter reached such an extent that police cases were sought to be booked against the transport officials concerned. “It was strange, indeed. How could any one complain to the police against officials carrying out their duties? I raised this at a meeting with the Superintendent of Police,” said Deputy Transport Commissioner T. Raghunath. What the SP had assured the DTC was not revealed for reasons best known to the transport officials themselves. But it is clear that the drive against the illicit operations of private vehicles will continue to incur the wrath of the public till the APSRTC rises to the occasion and fully meets the travel needs of the public. The DTC asserts this at every possible opportunity and without fail.

Most meetings to which journalists go to report the event begin with the organisers inviting VIPs and VVIPs on to the dais and greeting them with flower bouquets. Reporters who went to a press conference organised by a hypermarket were pleasantly surprised when the organisers gave each of them a lovely bouquet when they were leaving the conference hall. Though many of them did not know what to do with it immediately, some of them felt as though they were being recognised as ‘VIPs and VVIPs’.

Organisers of press conferences, sometimes, face a piquant situation if the event they want to brief reporters about is a mix of several events concerning the beats of more than one reporter. This was evident at a press meet organised by the Growth Leading to All-round Development (GLAD), an organisation floated by MP Lagadapati Rajagopal, to announce various sports and cultural events for school children in the run up to Children’s Day. Though all sports scribes from the print media were invited for the press meet, the organisers were keen on getting equal publicity for the cultural and literary events too. “I know culture is not your beat, but please do not restrict your reports to sports information alone. Kindly pass on the information pertaining to cultural events to cultural reporters so that more school children can participate,” pleaded the organisers.

(P. Sujatha Varma, G. Ravikiran, G.V.Ramana Rao and J.R. Shridharan)

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