Nellore: The118th birth anniversary of former Deputy PM DR Babu Jagjivan Ram was observed on Saturday. On this occasion, leaders of various political parties, officials, and SC, ST Associations leaders garlanded the statue of the former Deputy PM and paid floral tributes.

MLAs Somireddy Chandramohan Reddy and Kotamreddy Sridhar Reddy, MLC Beeda Ravichandra Yadav, district Collector O Anand, Joint Collector K Karthik and others garlanded the statue of the departed leader.

YSRCP city president Parvathareddy Chandrasekhar Reddy, SP G Krishnakanth, ASP Soujanya and other officials, paid tributes to the potrait of Jagjivan Ram.

Social welfare department has organised a special programme at Tikkana Pranganam in the Collectorate. Collector Anand, chief guest, described former Deputy PM Jagjivan Ram as a great social reformer, adding that he was responsible for providing social justice to downtrodden communities, who were facing social stigma in those days.

The Collector said that there are 30 per cent SC, ST population existing in the district. Stating that the government has launched several welfare programmes for uplifting the living standards of downtrodden communities, he urged them to utilise the opportunities. He disclosed that about 10,000 Girijan families do not have Aadhar Cards and the government has initiated steps to provide Aadhar cards to them so that they can avail welfare schemes.

Expressing deep concern over child marriages rampant in the district, the Collector said that the administration striving hard to eradicate such social evil by increasing literacy rate in those communities.

Joint Collector K Karthik has urged SC, ST communities to occupy higher positions by utilising reservations provided for them in the constitution.

DRO Udaya Baskar Rao, Social Welfare DD Sobharani, SC Corporation ED Srinivasulu and others were present.