By IANS,
Hyderabad/New Delhi: The war within the ruling Congress party over the proposed Telangana state intensified Tuesday while unrest raged in Andhra Pradesh’s coastal and Rayalseema regions against the proposed formation of the new state.
The sharp differences among Congress leaders from Telangana on the one hand and Rayalseema and Andhra were starkly evident in the Lok Sabha where they traded charges against one another, leading to brief adjournment of the house.
Unwilling to accept the central government’s decision to carve 10 districts out of Andhra Pradesh into a Telangana, demonstrators took to the streets in most parts of Rayalseema and coastal Andhra where normal life was hit by a shutdown.
Rallies, demonstrations, meetings, relay hunger strikes as well as road and rail blockades affected life for the fifth consecutive day. State-run buses went off the roads.
Raising slogans of “Samaikya Andhra” (United Andhra), the protesters blocked vehicles and trains at Vijayawada, Guntur, Viskahapatnam, Nellore, Anantapur, Tirupati and other towns.
At least five people, including two policemen, were injured in clashes at Sri Krishnadevaraya University in Anatapur, about 360 km from Hyderabad. Sporadic incidents of violence were also reported from Krishna and Guntur.
In Anantapur, Telugu Desam Party (TDP) legislator P. Sunita and three others continued their hunger strike for the second day. In Vijayawada the indefinite fast by four TDP leaders continued for the third day.
The Congress MP from Vijayawada, L. Rajagopal, launched a hunger strike in the town after the police in Hyderabad foiled his attempts to protest there.
Y.S. Vivekananda Reddy, a Congress legislator and brother of the late chief minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, was arrested in Hyderabad when he sat on fast near the state secretariat. Police also sent him back to his native Kadapa district.
The Lok Sabha was adjourned after witnessing unruly scenes as Congress MPs sparred over Telangana.
The highlight of the drama was when YSR’s son Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy, who failed to become the chief minister after his father’s death in a chopper crash September, went up to Speaker Meira Kumar’s podium to join protesting TDP members.
Much to the surprise of his Congress colleagues, he shook hands with TDP members. He took a placard – “We want united AP” – held by one of them and waved it.
And as non-Congress members watched, Congress MPs from Telangana were locked in high-decibel verbal exchanges with their party colleagues ranged against the proposed state.
Furious Congress MPs from Telangana urged Defence Minister A.K. Antony, who is also chairman of the Congress disciplinary committee, to take action against YSR’s son for “colluding” with the TDP in the Lok Sabha.
Andhra Pradesh, one of India’s biggest states, remained divided on regional lines.
The monolithic TDP is facing the threat of a split, with its leaders from Telangana region pressing the leadership to divide the party.
Cutting across party lines, legislators marched from the state assembly to the secretariat before paying tributes to Potti Sriramulu — the founder father of Andhra Pradesh — on his death anniversary.
Sriramulu died this day in 1952 while fasting to separate the Telugu speaking people of then Madras Presidency. A year later, Andhra State was born with Kurnool as the capital. Andhra State was merged with Telangana region (then called Hyderabad State) in 1956 to form Andhra Pradesh.
TDP legislators, meanwhile, pressed the Andhra Pradesh assembly speaker to accept their resignations. As many as 138 members of the 294-member house from the two regions have submitted their resignations to protest the move to form Telangana state.
The mass resignations had forced the adjournment of the assembly sine die.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) accused the government of “playing with the sensitivities of people” over Telangana and sought a roadmap on the creation of the separate state.
“The government of India has complicated the issue. The state is in turmoil, students are on strike. More than 130 MLAs seem to have resigned,” BJP MP M. Venkaiah Naidu said in the Rajya Sabha.