AP Cong leaders camp in Delhi ahead of Telangana meeting

 Congress leaders from Andhra Pradesh are camping in Delhi on Thursday to bolster their respective lobbies in support of, or against the formation of, Telangana state as the party high command is preparing to meet on Friday to decide the issue.

Besides ministers, MLAs and MPs arrived in Delhi to make themselves available to leaders ahead of the party’s core committee meeting which will hear views of Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy, Deputy Chief Minister Damodara Rajanarasimha and Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) president Botsa Satyanarayana.

“We want to impress the high command that the interest of all regions will be served within a united Andhra,” said state infrastructure minister Ganta Srinivas Rao.

Unlike in 2009, the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS), the vociferous pro-statehood party, is no longer a part of the decision-making process. TRS President K Chandrasekhar Rao, who is watching the developments from his farm house in Karimnagar, has warned of agitations if Telangana state with Hyderabad is denied again.

Soon after the appointment of Digvijay Singh as state AICC general secretary in charge of Andhra Pradesh in place of Ghulam Nabi Azad, the Congress suggested a special package of Rs 25,000 crore for development of Telangana or forming the Rayala-Telangana region that would include the districts of Anantapur and Kurnool in Rayalaseema. Both proposals have been rejected by Telangana supporters including those in the Congress. “We are averse to clubbing Telangana with another region,” said TRS leader T Harish Rao.