Congress brass may not favour separate Telengana

NEW DELHI: The Congress appears to be unwilling to commit itself to anything beyond constituting a second states reorganisation committee when it comes to statehood for the Telengana region.

However, given the importance of the Telengana question to the Andhra Pradesh assembly elections, the party is postponing any formal announcement. Instead it has said that the Congress high command will announce the party���s stand through a policy statement soon.

An ambiguous stand will allow the party to deal with the considerable internal pressure on the creation of a separate state of Telengana.

���The Congress high command is going to come out with a policy statement on the Telengana issue. Let us wait. The high command has said several times that it would take an appropriate decision at an appropriate time,��� chief minister Y S Rajashekhara Reddy said.

Mr Reddy, who has been in the Capital since the weekend, met senior Congress leaders, including Sonia Gandhi. On Sunday, Mr Reddy met Pranab Mukherjee and Ahmed Patel. On Monday, Mr Reddy along with the Andhra Pradesh PCC chief D Srinivas, met Mr Mukherjee, Mr Patel, Mr Veerappa Moily and Mr AK Antony. Mr Reddy said that Telengana figured in the discussions as ���one of the issues���.

The Andhra Pradesh PCC chief is a votary of separate statehood for Telegana. Mr Reddy said that the Telegana issue was discussed during his meeting on Monday with party president Sonia Gandhi.

Even as a formal policy announcement is awaited, Mr Reddy said that the Congress would contest the assembly elections on its own. The Andhra Pradesh chief minister stopped short of describing the ���grand alliance��� of the Telegu Desam party, TRS and the Left parties as opportunistic.

���TRS chief Chandrasekhar Rao has now joined hands with two parties���TDP and Left���who have opposed creation of Telengana. The people will understand���