Demand for separate Vidarbha state raised in CWC meeting

NEW DELHI: The demand for a separate state of Vidarbha was echoed in the meeting of the Congress Working Committee which passed a unanimous resolution for the creation of a separate Telangana state.

Sources said AICC General Secretary Mukul Wasnik raised the issue of Vidarbha and said it was a long pending demand of the people of the region.

Gurudas Kamat, a senior leader from Maharashtra also supported Wasnik in carving out Vidarbha out of Maharashtra.

Among the others who spoke in the meeting included Ambika Soni, who was AICC in charge of Andhra Pradesh some years ago.

Earlier today, hailing the decision to create Telangana, senior Congress leader Vilas Muttemwar made a strong plea for carving out Vidarbha state out of Maharashtra.

In a letter to party chief Sonia Gandhi, Muttemwar, MP, said: "Now when the Telangana state has been agreed to be carved out of Andhra Pradesh, people of Vidarbha will have genuine resentment if their similar demand for creation of separate Vidarbha state is not simultaneously agreed to."

Though Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde and Finance Minister P Chidambaram are not part of the CWC, were invited for the meeting.