By IANS
Hyderabad : Seven non-Telangana legislators belonging to the ruling Congress party Friday resigned from the state assembly committee, which is monitoring repatriation of non-local government employees from the Telangana region.
Senior leader G. Venkat Reddy and six other legislators from coastal Andhra and Rayalseema regions submitted their resignations to Speaker K.R. Suresh Reddy. They alleged that they were being humiliated by members from the Telangana region.
The resignations came a day after coastal Andhra legislators stayed away from a meeting of the committee, which was formed to ensure implementation of Government Order 610, relating to repatriation of non-local government employees from the region.
Suresh Reddy said he would talk to House committee chairman N. Uttam Kumar Reddy before taking a decision on resignations.
A committee meeting on Thursday had witnessed heated exchanges between the Congress and opposition legislators, who accused the government of delaying the implementation of the order till the next assembly elections.
Opposition parties alleged that Home Minister K. Jana Reddy was not sincere towards the repatriation of 3,000 non-local policemen working in the region. They also clamed that about 500 of the 700 posts for constables – for which recruitment was done recently – were given to non-locals.
Reacting to the resignations, the main opposition Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) said it was a deliberate step to delay implementation of the order.
The TRS, which is fighting for separate statehood for the Telangana region, comprising 10 districts including Hyderabad, has called for public agitation to speed up the implementation.
Order 610 was issued by then chief minister N.T. Rama Rao on Dec 30, 1985 to repatriate non-locals who were recruited in the region in violation of the six-point formula relating to quota for locals.
The issue has remained a bone of contention between Telangana and other regions since then. Successive governments formed committees to look into the issue and though these reported large-scale violations of the six-point formula, no action was taken to repatriate non-locals.
Telangana parties claim that about 60,000 non-locals were working in various government departments in the region. The repatriation issue has its origin in the violent agitation for separate Telangana state in 1969. More than 300 people were killed during the agitation.
The issue once again come to the fore when TRS was formed in 2001 to revive the movement for separate statehood for Telangana and emerged as a key political force in the region in 2004 elections.