Several rounds of meetings, day-long brainstorming sessions at the Congress war-room and a two-hour-long Core Committee meeting of the party top brass seems to have culminated in a political decision on the formation of Telangana State carved out of the existing Andhra Pradesh.
It’s not a fire-cracker moment yet as the ball has been pushed to the government’s court. Indicating the political call has been taken, Digvijaya Singh, AICC in-charge of Andhra Pradesh, said a decision is “now awaited from the government”.
“The consultation process is over. Now await the decision (announcement) of the party (CWC) as well as the UPA government,’’ Digvijaya Singh added, coming out of the last meeting which was of that of the core group attended by Congress heavyweights including A K Antony, P Chidambaram, Sushilkumar Shinde and Ghulam Nabi Azad.
Right after the long Congress core group meet, chaired by party chief Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, got over on a cloud-cast Friday evening, a rather dejected looking Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy left for Hyderabad. He did not seem pleased with the decision.
But, sources said, it has been conveyed to the Andhra Pradesh leadership — the CM and PCC chief Botcha Satyanarayana — that a “political decision” in favour of Telangana has been made and everyone has to “cooperate” and work towards minimising the political fallout.
“However, this does not mean the State will be bifurcated tomorrow. The administrative process, which will give shape to the political decision will take time — some details are still being worked out,” a top-level source in the Congress party said.
The final verdict, as was expected, came from Sonia Gandhi after it was generally accepted that it was an “irreversible situation”.
The government decision may be announced before Parliament meets for the Monsoon session on August 5.
A senior Cabinet Minister from the State indicated that it has been decided that the creation of separate Telanagana bill will be brought in the coming session as it may be the last full-fledged sitting of the 14th Lok Sabha.
Prior to taking the Telangana issue to Parliament, the Congress Working Committee meeting is likely to take place, to be followed by consultations with allies and UPA partners. For the record, Digvijaya Singh, however, kept it a little open-ended saying, “Consultations over, time to take a decision has come.”