Congress ministers from Telangana to withdraw resignation

HYDERABAD: All the 13 Congress ministers from Telangana region in Andhra Pradesh today decided to withdraw their resignation after the Centre's announcement on holding discussions with political parties.

"We are satisfied with the decision of the Centre to initiate the process of discussions (with 8 recognised political parties).

"We met APCC President D Srinivas who asked us to withdraw the resignation. We have decided to withdraw our resignation," Information Minister Geeta Reddy told reporters after the meeting.

The decision comes a day after Union home minister P Chidambaram sent an invitation to leaders of 8 parties for discussions in Delhi on January 5 on the Telangana statehood issue.

The ministers resigned after Chidambaram's announcement on December 23 putting the Telangana issue on the backburner saying he would initiate wide ranging discussions on the issue. Earlier on December 9 he had announced that the process for Telangana state would be initiated.

Reddy said the ministers had last week represented to the Congress leadership and "we never expected that they will respond so quickly."

She thanked Congress President Sonia Gandhi and other senior leaders including Pranab Mukherjee and Ahmed Patel for the Centre's initiative.

Has Congress set a dangerous precedence by agreeing to create the state of Telengana?