By IANS,
New Delhi : The central government has called a meeting Jan 5 of leaders of eight recognised political parties of Andhra Pradesh to discuss the Telangana issue and look at ways to break the logjam. Home Minister P. Chidambaram Wednesday sent out the letters to the political parties.
Chidambaram’s invitation comes after a day-long shutdown in Hyderabad and nine other districts of Telangana called by the all-party Joint Action Committee (JAC), demanding statehood to the region.
The strike evoked total response. Transport services were paralysed while shops, business establishments, petrol bunks, cinema theatres, banks, offices and educational institutions remained closed.
The shutdown, the fifth since the beginning of Telangana agitation a month ago, affected work in IT/ITeS and pharma companies in the technology hub.
Earlier this week the Congress core committee took stock of the crisis in Andhra Pradesh and considered the option of forming a panel that includes representatives of the state government, centre and political parties.
On Dec 23, the home minister said that wide-ranging consultations would be held with all political parties and groups in the state, adding that the union government would take “steps to involve all concerned in the process”.
Recalling his Dec 9 statement in which he had announced that the process of forming Telangana would be initiated, Chidambaram also said that since then the situation in the state had altered and that “a large number of political parties were divided on the issue”.
The Congress leadership had also mulled the constitution of a second State Reorganisation Committee.
But this proposal was abandoned after some leaders pointed out that such a suggestion would create more trouble with more regions demanding separate statehood.