Telangana Congress legislators split into two groups

Congress legislators hailing from Telangana vertically split tonight into two groups with one section stoutly opposing the move to resign on the statehood issue from their posts while the other favouring it.

In the end, however, only four MLAs and two MLCs decided to submit their resignations on Monday.

At the end of a three-and-a-half-hour meeting at the MLAs quarters here tonight, a handful of legislators, including former ministers R Damodar Reddy and Ch Mutyam Reddy, announced that they would indeed quit their posts in protest against the terms of reference set for the Srikrishna Committee on the statehood issue.

Damodar Reddy, along with another former minister K Jana Reddy, has been active in the Telangana Political Joint Action Committee but after the meeting they both apparently fell apart as Jana stoutly opposed the resignations.

In fact, Jana reportedly asked Damodar not to announce their move to quit but the latter defied him and told reporters that four MLAs - himself, Mutyam Reddy, Bhikshamaiah Goud, Narsa Reddy -- and two MLCs Mohan Reddy and Rajalingam would put in their papers on Monday.

Only about 20 out of the 52 Telangana Congress MLAs attended the meeting, party sources said. 

Immediately upon announcing their decision to quit, Damodar Reddy went to attend the JAC meeting. 

Meanwhile, all the 13 ministers hailing from Telangana have also decided not to resign from their posts.

"There is no point in resigning at this stage," a senior minister said.

Earlier in the day, Congress legislators hailing from Telangana remained indecisive on whether or not to resign from their posts while the Telugu Desam Party MLAs linked their resignations to the former.

Since the five-member Srikrishna Committee got into business, the Congress high command sent out a clear warning to its legislators against any move to resign and cause trouble for the K Rosaiah government.

Former ministers K Jana Reddy and R Damodar Reddy were the only prominent Congress MLAs from the region who attended the meeting while lone MP G Vivekananda was present.

Meanwhile, some Telangana Congress MPs wrote letters to AICC chief Sonia Gandhi, prime minister Manmohan Singh and Union home minister P Chidambaram expressing displeasure over
the terms of reference set for Srikrishna Committee.

They particularly took exception to the linking of Telangana issue with the demand for a united Andhra Pradesh.

Also, they wanted the panel's tenure limited to six months.

None of the Congress leaders were willing to speak on record on their internal deliberations. They were also not ready to release a copy of the letter written to high command. 

On the other hand, TDP MLAs from Telangana decided to abide the decision of the JAC on the resignations with a rider that they would put in their papers only if the Congress legislators too followed suit.

Senior TDP MLAs asserted they will resign "only along with the Congress MLAs". TDP sources said party president N Chandrababu Naidu directed his Telangana MLAs not to take any
decision on resignations in haste and take any action only in
tune with the Congress.

"There is no point in our resignation if the Congress MLAs did not do so," was the TDP legislators' refrain. 

Meanwhile, the two Praja Rajyam Party MLAs from Telangana too have decided to submit their resignations to Assembly Speaker N Kiran Kumar Reddy. One of the two MLAs, Y Anil, is returning from the US tomorrow while the other, Maheshwar Reddy, reached Hyderabad today. Maheshwar told PTI "We are meeting the Speaker tomorrow to submit our resignations."