It seems PRP chief Chiranjeevi was not keen on leading a protest against price rise on Thursday and staging what would be his first political arrest, according to sources.”On Wednesday night, he inquired from senior leaders like Devender Goud as to what would courting arrest mean. Would it involve being locked up in a police station, Chiranjeevi asked and suggested that he would monitor the protest from the party office rather than physically lead it. However, he was prevailed upon to lead the protest,” one leader told media.

Chiranjeevi’s entry enthused his supporters and the protest became disruptive due to the presence of the media. Finding the cameras focused on them, the PRP supporters soon blocked the lower road on either side and extended it to the flyover that went over the Paradise crossing.

Within minutes, traffic was paralysed on both sides due to the sit-in by PRP workers. As this road was blocked, commuters jammed up on the Paradise Hotel-Prenderghast Road which compounded the jam eventually all the way to the Punjagutta crossroads. After the PRP activists held up traffic for almost one-and-half hours, the police, who played mute spectators for an unusually long period, finally arrested the protesters after resorting to a mild lathicharge.While the arrested workers and leaders looked at ease when being loaded on to a police bus, the PRP chief was clearly not so.