The Telangana fire threatened to blow out of control with the “betrayed” Telangana Rashtriya Samiti (TRS) calling for a 48-hour bandh late on Wednesday, hours after Union home minister P Chidambaram said the situation in Andhra Pradesh has “altered” and there was a need for wider consultations before bifurcating the state.
The Congress-led UPA government appears to have put the statehood issue on the backburner citing divide among political parities as the reason. Completely backtracking from his declaration in favour of Telangana, Chidambaram said the Centre will take “steps to involve all concerned in the process”.
He had invited the wrath of leaders within the Congress for his December 9 statement favouring the creation of Telangana.
But the change in stance drew a sharp reaction from TRS chief K Chandrasekhar Rao, who called a 48-hour bandh and submitted his resignation. Twenty-nine other MPs from Telangana also resigned and sporadic protests were reported from the region.
“Chidambaram’s statement amounts to putting the Telangana issue on the back burner. We have been betrayed once again.” Rao said there is no clarity or time frame fixed. “In the name of consensus, will they take 150 years? How much time they are going to take (for creating Telangana)?” he said.
The government’s about-turn on the issue was preceded by a series of meetings that Union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee had with groups of MPs from Andhra Pradesh and senior Congress leaders, including Chidambaram.
The anti-Telangana MPs, mostly belonging to the coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema regions, seemed to have succeeded in pressuring the government against taking a hurried decision on carving out a new state.
The Centre rethink on Telangana followed a change of stance by N Chandrababu Naidu’s Telugu Desam Party (TDP). The main opposition party in the state, the TDP had first supported the creation of Telangana, but later backtracked under pressure from party MPs and MLAs.
A similar U-turn by Chiranjeevi’s Praja Rajayam Party made the situation vulnerable for the Centre.
Extending the olive branch of “holding wide-ranging consultations” with all sections of society in the state, Chidambaram appealed to the people, particularly the students, to call off their strike and restore peace.
—With inputs from agencies
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