Congress and allies to hold Telangana row meet on July 31

IANS/New Delhi

The Congress will on July 31 discuss the vexed issue of carving out a separate Telangana state from Andhra Pradesh with its allies in the United Progressive Alliance, informed sources said yesterday.

The all-powerful Congress Working Committee may also meet the same day to discuss the issue, said the sources.

The Congress, which has completed the process of consultations on the issue, will now try to take the allies on board before it takes a final call, said the sources. But that will not be easy, as the party is divided on the issue, they said.

While the central leadership appeared to be open to the idea of a separate Telangana state, Congress MPs from other parts of Andhra Pradesh were opposed to division, said the sources.

Four anti-Telangana MPs, including union ministers M M Pallam Raju, K S Rao, Chiranjeevi and D Purandeshwari (all belonging to coastal Andhra) on Saturday met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to push for a united Andhra Pradesh. The leaders told the prime minister that there would be repercussions not only for the state but also for the entire country if Andhra Pradesh was divided.

The delegation sought to impress upon the prime minister that splitting Andhra Pradesh would not be in the interest of the people or any region of the coastal state, and it would trigger similar demands in Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh where there were long standing demands for similar separate states.

Meanwhile, the BJP yesterday demanded that the process for formation of Telangana should be expedited.

“We support the Telangana cause. The BJP is committed to form the state. The government should grant it immediately,” party chief Rajnath Singh told reporters after attending the BJP’s Scheduled Castes Morcha’s national executive meeting in New Delhi.

He also said that if the state was not formed now, the BJP would ensure its formation when it comes to power.

The BJP has been vocally supporting formation of Telangana, saying it would support the bill for carving a separate state out of Andhra Pradesh, whenever the government brings it in parliament.

The party has also been slamming the Congress-led central government for delaying the matter. While there are strong indications that the government may go ahead with formation of Telangana, no formal announcement has been made so far.

On Saturday protesters took to streets in Rayalaseema and Andhra regions of the state opposing the division plans.

Students and activists of various political and non-political groups took out rallies, formed human chains and observed shutdown in some parts of Seemandhra, as the two regions are generally referred to. Educational institutions remained closed in several towns on a call given by Samaikhya Andhra or United Andhra students’ Joint Action Committee.

 Hundreds of students participated in a rally in Nellore, demanding the central government to drop any move to split the state. Congress legislator Anam Vivekananda Reddy also addressed the rally.

GJM calls shutdown demanding Gorkhaland

The Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) has called a 72-hour shutdown in northern West Bengal’s Darjeeling Hills from today, demanding a new state of Gorkhaland. “We have given a call for the shutdown to press home our demand for Gorkhaland,” GJM general secretary Roshan Giri said. “We have been told that the central government is going to concede the demand to carve out a Telengana state out of Andhra Pradesh. When they are ready to form Telengana, why wouldn’t they give us Gorkhaland?” Giri asked. The long-standing agitation for forming a separate state out of the northern West Bengal hills has led to loss of many lives over the past two decades, besides hitting hard the region’s economic mainstays of tea, timber and tourism. On July 18, 2011, a tripartite agreement was signed between the GJM, and the state and central governments for setting up Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA), an autonomous and elected hill council.