According to sources, Kiran Kumar Reddy has sent his resignation to Congress President Sonia Gandhi on Monday evening. He reportedly stated that he does not want to see the division of Andhra Pradesh as the Chief Minister. However, the report of resignation is yet to be confirmed by any official or party spokesperson.

The decision to submit resignation is believed to have been taken during the meeting that the Chief Minister had with his cabinet colleagues from Rayalaseema and Andhra regions at the State Secretariat on Monday evening. Ministers – Anam Ramnarayan Reddy, Ganta Srinivasa Rao, K Parthasarathy, Pithani Satyanarayana and other senior leaders from the Seemandhra region participated in the meeting.

It may be mentioned that the Congress High Command has summoned Kiran Kumar Reddy, Deputy CM Damodar Rajanarasimha, PCC Chief Botsa Satyanarayana to New Delhi ahead of the CWC meeting which will be preceded by the meeting of UPA Coordination Committee. With the Centre looking firm on granting statehood to the Telangana region, the Chief Minister and his cabinet colleagues from Seemandhra have decided to resign en-masse to pressurise the Centre to defer decision on Telangana.

It is not yet known whether Kiran Kumar Reddy will proceed to New Delhi on Tuesday.

Talking to reporter here, Digvijay Singh said although he was not aware of the meetings’ agenda, he said a decision has to be taken on the Telangana issue by the CWC. With regard to UPA Panel’s meeting, he said since he was not a member of UPA Coordination Committee, he was not aware of its agenda.

When asked about the reports of Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy giving resignation in protest against the possible division of Andhra Pradesh, Digvijay Singh pleaded ignorance and said he was not aware of it. INN

TDP President N Chandrababu Naidu, who is on his padayatra, said that the budget has nothing to offer to the small and medium industries and this will raise unemployment. Over 1.50 lakh farmers have committed suicides during the UPA-II and the government could not contain inflation, he said.

Nearly 60 per cent of the farmers in the state are deep in debts and the government could not provide any help to them, he said. He also criticized the State Government for not taking up the Babli case seriously. INN

TRS is prepared to merge the party with Congress to secure Telangana and if it fails, many Congress leaders are prepared to join TRS. Elections are far enough but an agreement is eluding both the parties on the merger terms, hence the delay in decision making, so it appears going by the recent developments.

First it was K Chandrasekhar Rao, who was in Delhi for some time, broached the subject and had secret meetings with Congress High Command and suddenly went into hibernation.

When there was no response or answer to his satisfaction, TRS started firing with all guns. Congress leaders are being sandwiched between the high command and TRS, deal or no deal.

Congress has a wide experience in handling such issues. Recently it had merged PRP, allotting ministerial berths at state and centre, before that many off-shoots of Congress made it to the parent party. Reddy Congress and Tiwari Congress are the two parties to name a few.

KCR had come from TDP is a different thing. Many leaders have defected to Congress form TDP from P Upendra to Renuka Choudhary to K Jana Reddy. The problem now seems to be uncertainty of the future of Congress leaders on both sides. The party is in catch 22 situation and to wriggle out, it needs a very tender prescription, which seems to be difficult.

The tempo has to be sustained for one more year and in between it has to wade through at least three sessions of Parliament and Assembly assuming that UPA will not go for a snap poll. Both at the Centre and State, the Government is on a wafer thin majority and a minor shift can usher in constitutional crisis.

The first priority will be to complete the formality of budget session both at the centre and State. It has to sustain the tempo that long on one hand and keep its flock together on the other. The dual task is very tough and all wise brains should come together to make it a reality.

Congress has been in similar situations earlier, but this time it has trouble from within as well. Any rupture with TRS will reflect on its only leaders from Telangana region and this is new dimension that the party unable to grapple with.

The coming days will show the way, either way. INN

The TRS supremo slammed the Congress leaders for being in a party which does not respect the local sentiments and said his party will seek the support of some other coalition if not UPA. “It is shameful for the leaders to stay in the party despite so many insults and rejections. If they are only after power and drift away from people, they will have to pay a heavy price,” he said at the Samara Deeksha here on Monday.

Spitting fire at the Centre, he said how many more discussions and meetings will it conduct. These are only to bid time away as the Centre is not keen in solving the problem.

“Our ultimate goal is to achieve Telangana. For this we need not be submissive to UPA. If not UPa we some other dispensation will come to help us,” he said.

Doling out the region wise statistics, he said, while the revenue from Telangana is more, the expenditure in Andhra region is more. The discrimination continues and we have to break the shackles.

Coming down heavily on the State Congress leaders, he said “these people have no self respect. They are only pawns in the hands of high command and have no concern to the cause of Telangana.”

Projects in Rayalaseema have come up without any permission and water was diverted from Telangana though Pothireddypadu, he said. Enough is enough we will live our own way if the state is given, he said. INN