Centre likely to announce time-bound panel soon

NEW DELHI: Even as the Congress Working Committee (CWC) gets set to discuss the Telangana issue at its next meeting expected within a fortnight’s time, there are indications that the Centre will announce a panel to go into the dispute over the creation of the new state.

The Congress core group, which includes the party’s top leadership, party chief Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, as well as senior Union ministers, is likely to have discussed the Telangana issue at its routine Friday evening meeting. In addition to Ms Gandhi and the PM, home minister P Chidambaram, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee and defence minister A K Antony were present at the meeting.

Sources indicated that one of the proposals being considered by the government is the appointment of a judicial commission with a stipulated time-frame to go into the creation of Telangana. Last Friday’s core group meeting had decided to announce the Telangana mechanism ahead of the January 28 deadline set by the Telangana joint action committee (JAC) for Centre to spell out a time-frame for the creation of the state.

Telangana Congress MPs and Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) chief D Srinivas are currently in the Capital to discuss the Telangana issue with the party’s top leaders. Mr Srinivas met Ms Gandhi on Friday and Congress MPs from the region met Mr Antony.

Telangana had become tense after students committed suicides allegedly over the delay in the creation of the state. In this backdrop, the Congress’ elected leaders are especially under pressure by the political JAC — which includes Congress, TRS, TDP and other pro-statehood forces — to put in their resignations to protest the delay in the announcement of the Telangana panel.

The Congress leaders have been stuck between following the diktats of the high command which has asked them not to put in their papers and that of the political JAC which has been pressing for the opposite. In fact, there was even talk of Congress quitting the JAC and forming its own front. However, senior Congress MLA from Telangana R Damodar Reddy said in Hyderabad on Friday that the party would remain a constituent of the JAC.

“We have kept aside our flags and joined hands for one agenda, that is formation of Telangana. We will remain part of the JAC,” he said.

With the Congress leaders fearing that the party will lose credit for Telangana if the Centre dithers anymore on the announcement of the time-bound panel, the Centre is under pressure to be seen as acting.