Count down starts for Congress: TRS chief

Uplifting the cause of separate ‘Telengana Rashtra,’ the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) chief K Chandrashekhar Rao on Wednesday gave ultimatum to Congress led UPA government to initiate the process of creating a separate state by March 6, 2008 failing which will force the party to quit office by all their MPs, MLAs, and MLCs.

The strength of TRS includes four MPs, sixteen MLAs and three MLCs. The party chief, along with its elected members said here while addressing a press conference that we have to see the effectiveness of the UPA government till the Budget session whether it stands on its pledge made to the TRS party in creating a separate state or otherwise we would work on deadline issued to the Central government.

To a question Why March 6 has been chosen by the party as the termination of the deadline, the TRS chief said, “The number is considered lucky for me.”

One after one hurdle facing by the Congress has put the party on back foot. First the Left already had warned the Congress to face the consequence in terms of its withdrawal of support if the Congress party goes ahead on finalising the nuclear deal. And now the fresh ultimatum by TRS has forced the Central party to take firm action or else would face the same consequence as declared by the Left party.

The announcement by TRS chief K Chandrashekar Rao has put the Telangana issue on the boil. Energised by its leader and riding by pro-Telangana wave, protagonists of the Telangana party both in the Congress and the TDP, would step up pressure on their respective leadership to come clean on the statehood issue.

“Our MPs, MLAs and MLCs will submit their resignations on March 6, if the government fails to commence the process for carving out Telangana. This is the last chance for the Congress to prove its sincerity,” Chandrashekhar Rao told at a Press conference.

Taking the seriousness of the separate statehood issue, the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Rajshekhar Reddy reached Delhi to discuss with Congress president Sonia Gandhi to discuss the setting up a second states reorganisation committee to deal on the matter.

The AICC did a flip-flop over the Second State Reorganisation Commission, SRC by first saying it would be constituted soon and later saying that the SRC is not needed as Telangana is mentioned in the UPA’s Common Minimum Programme.

The AICC spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi explained three formulations on SRC at Wednesday’s press conference. He said setting up an SRC, “as prime minister said, is not an immediate agenda” before the Centre “at the moment”; that the “Telangana statehood issue is a stand alone matter that could be considered by the Centre even without an SRC, by exploring a larger consensus among parties” and that “the Centre could also examine demands for creating new states from other parts of the country either by setting up an SRC or by evolving a broad consensus among concerned parties.”

By looking ups and downs in the statement of the Congress, the TRS chief asked the Centre and the Congress to clarify their positions.

He suggested them to seek the report of the UPA sub-committee presided by External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, which was involved in the process of achieving a consensus on Telangana.

He came down heavily on the Congress and accused it of decepting the people of Telangana. “If the Telangana Bill is tabled in Parliament, it would get two-thirds majority,” Rao said.

Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) was formed as a regional political party in Andhra Pradesh by Chandrashekhar Rao in 2001 with the sole purpose of separation of the region of Telangana from Andhra Pradesh. Before the formation of the party, the TRS chief was the member of the Telugu Desam Party (TDS).

In September 2006 the party withdrew support from the central government for not keeping up its electoral pledge to create Telangana, also put in the Common Minimum Programme.

Some years ago in 2000 three separate states were constituted after prolonged agitation for instances Chhattisgarh, bifurcated from Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand from Bihar on November 15, and Uttarakhand, which was known by Uttaranchal at the time of bifurcation from Uttar Pradesh on November 9 in the same year.

The tendency of constituting separate states is getting alarming day by day as it would hinder the security of the country as well as the newly constructed state would incur the expenditure on various infrastructures on all the layers including geographical, economical, administrative, and constitutional. The language, rituals and culture based separate states would eventually lead to autonomy from the country if it is not prevented at the initial stage.