NEW DELHI: The twin issues of the Army chief’s claim that he was offered bribe and the demand for separate Telangana state rocked Parliament on Monday. As soon as the Lok Sabha assembled, Congress members from the Telangana region and MPs from the TRS and the TDP raised the Telanagana issue and rushed to well demanding statehood for Telangana. Some of the members waved copies of newspapers carrying reports of suicides in the Telangana region.
Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar had to adjourn the House till noon as BJP members also joined in raising the issue of the Army chief’s claim that he was offered bribe to clear the purchase of vehicles for the Forces. The Lok Sabha had witnessed two more adjournments before it was finally adjourned for the day as MPs from the Telangana region continued to raise the Telangana issue.
In the Rajya Sabha, the Telangana issue was raised during the Zero Hour as the House was adjourned during the Question Hour over the Army chief’s allegations of bribe. Opposition members demanded from the government a CBI inquiry ordered into Army Chief V K Singh’s disclosure. Raising the issue of suicide by a tribal student in Andhra Pradesh, demanding creation of Telangana state, BJP member Prakash Javadekar pointed that 609 persons had committed suicide on the issue of Telangana so far. He said that the government had to show political will to bring a Bill for creation of Telangana. He said ‘the NDA will support any such Bill’.
In an embarrassment for the ruling party, Congress member from the Telangana region K Keshav Rao joined the BJP in slamming the ‘delay’ by the Centre in formation of separate Telangana state.
Kesava Rao supported the contention of Javadekar and said: “It is not one or two persons that Javadekar is talking about. It is about the 700 people who died there. Give me an instance in history, where 700 people died for one cause. Do you want more people to die for this cause? If you want three crore people to die for this, they will die.”