AICC general secretary in charge of Andhra Pradesh unit affairs Ghulam Nabi Azad and another general Secretary Digvijay Singh held hectic discussions with their party chief Sonia Gandhi at her 10 Janpath residence in New Delhi on Friday.
Congress leaders in the state think the talks centred on the Telangana issue as the party high command has been doing an exercise to find a solution to the contentious issue. Lending credence to the speculation, TRS supremo K Chandrasekhar Rao, who has been camping in Delhi for the past few days and holding discussions with several key persons in the AICC over the issue of state’s bifurcation, called on AICC emissary to the state Vayalar Ravi on Friday and was closeted with him for over 45 minutes. It was his second meeting with Ravi this week.
KCR stays put in Delhi
TRS chief K Chandrasekhar Rao is camping in Delhi, hoping to bring his 11-year-old fight to a logical end by persuading the Congress high command to make an announcement in favour of creation of Telangana state. But Telangana organisations have no such faith in the Congress and want Rao to carry on the movement for separate state. According his close aides, Rao believes the Centre will make a statement very soon and, in anticipation of it, he is continuing one-to-one talks with AICC leaders and Union ministers in Delhi.
Offering a bait of sorts, he has even declared that he will merge his party in the Congress if the aspirations of Telangana people are met. One TRS leader said that though the AICC leadership did not invite his party chief to Delhi, he wanted to end the stalemate. “The TRS believes that 11-year efforts of the TRS chief forced all the political parties in the state to support the demand for Telangana state. The Congress promised Telangana state at the time of the 2004 and 2009 elections. The UPA government included it in the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) and the President referred to the issue in his address in 2004.
The UPA government came out with a statement on creation on Telangana state on December 9, 2009 and appointed the Justice Srikrishna Committee.