Congress in no hurry in AP

NEW DELHI: In keeping with its decision not to give in to pressure from the Y S Jaganmohan Reddy group to make him chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, Congress on Sunday indicated that the succession decision would not be taken in a hurry.

Andhra AICC in-charge and Union law minister Veerappa Moily said the party wanted to get the timing of the decision right. ���We believe in timing. We will time it in an appropriate way because for another four-and-a-half years we have to look forward to providing a stable government as far as Andhra Pradesh is concerned,��� the leader said. The leader added that the party ���could not give a timeline���, but said Congress President Sonia Gandhi would take a decision ���shortly���.

The statement comes even as K V P Ramachandra Rao, YSR���s close aide and the architect of the ���Jagan-for-CM��� campaign, continues to lobby for making the late CM���s son his successor. The leader is scheduled to meet senior leader and finance minister Pranab Mukherjee on Sunday night. Mr Rao held meetings with Mr Moily and Congress president���s political secretary Ahmed Patel on Saturday. Though the Jagan camp has been maintaining that it will not accept anything short of Congress anointing the 36-year-old Kadappa MP as YSR���s successor, it has had to contend with an unrelenting Congress leadership, which had conveyed its displeasure at the emotionally-charged campaign launched by Jagan���s supporters even before his father���s body had been laid to rest.

The Congress high command���s thinking was also made clear by Mr Mukherjee, who, while speaking at the Indian Women���s Press Corps on Friday, had indicated that the party would wait for the ���emotional upsurge��� in AP to settle down before taking a decision.