Government mulls all-party meet on Telangana

PTI

New Delhi, 16 January 2010: The Centre is contemplating convening a meeting of recognised political parties of Andhra Pradesh before the Republic Day to discuss recommendations of Srikrishna Committee on Telangana, in a bid to find an acceptable solution to the statehood issue.

Sources said the government would like to take a decision on the recommendations of the Committee possibly before the Budget session of Parliament starting in February-end.

“Home Minister P. Chidambaram would shortly be calling a meeting of all political parties again to get their views on the report,” a senior government official said.

A decision about the possible date is expected to be taken at a high-level meeting scheduled to be held on Monday.

As three major parties — Telangana Rashtriya Samiti (TRS), Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) — did not participate in the January 6 meeting, where the report was made public, the Centre was treading cautiously and expecting participation of all the eight parties.

 

Women members of the Telangana Rashtriya Samiti painting the roads with rangolis demanding the formation of separate Telangana state in Karimnagar on Friday.

 

The Centre is hopeful that all the eight political parties will attend the next meeting on Telangana.

However, it is not clear how many representatives will be invited from each party. Since two representatives were invited for the January meeting, the TRS had alleged that the Centre wanted a split opinion from each party, leading to its boycott.

Two key recommendations

Though the Srikrishna Committee gave six options to find a solution to the Telangana issue, the panel itself rejected the first four options suggested by it as “non—practicable“.

So, the next meeting will mainly concentrate on the two key recommendations —— keeping Andhra Pradesh united with Constitutional and Statutory measures for empowerment of the Telangana region as it “is the best way forward” and creating a separate state which can be the “second best” option to tackle the statehood issue.

The Committee itself found that the other four options —— maintaining status quo, bifurcating the state into Seemandhra and Telangana with Hyderabad as Union Territory and the states having their own capitals, bifurcation into Rayala—Telangana and coastal Andhra regions with Hyderabad as part of Rayala—Telangana and bifurcation into Seemandhra and Telangana with enlarged Hyderabad metropolis as a separate Union Territory —— made by it are not practicable.

As part of the exercise to find an amicable solution, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee had already met some MPs from Andhra Pradesh.