Hyderabad: With the United Progressive Alliance coordination committee scheduled to meet in New Delhi on Wednesday to finalise the ruling coalition’s stand on the issue of Telangana state, political activity has reached a feverish pitch in the state. All sides — supporters and the opponents of Telangana state — were pulling out all the stops to further buttress their claims.

Fifteen state ministers and four union ministers from Seema-Andhra regions of Andhra Pradesh have written to Congress president Sonia Gandhi that they will resign if the state was divided.

State minister P Balaraju told reporters that the letter had elaborated the consequences of dividing the state and the harm it will cause to the people and the party. “But our resignation will be only from our posts [as ministers] and not from the party”, he added.

Speculations were rife in Hyderabad and New Delhi that Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy, unhappy with the indications of bifurcation of the state had submitted his resignation to Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s office on Friday.

According to some reports the resignation was with Ahmad Patel, political secretary to Sonia Gandhi and top leaders of the party were trying to persuade Reddy to withdraw it.

Reddy has been keeping a low profile ever since he returned to Hyderabad in a huff on Friday and has cancelled all his appointments.

However the sources said that Reddy will not press the resignation now but wait until a formal decision has been taken or announced by the Congress Working Committee.

Turmoil

The political uncertainty has caused an unprecedented administrative inertia and normal functioning of the state secretariat in Hyderabad has come to a standstill. Most of the employees were busy chatting about developments and their future.

Other parties were also passing through turmoil. The YSR Congress party suffered a major setback when all the important party leaders from Telangana region including former minister Konda Surekha and her husband former MLC Konda Murli decided to quit the party in protest against the resignation by the 16 party MLAs of Seema-Andhra region.

As the MLAs resigned to stall Telangana, the party leaders from Telangana region were angry. They tried to seek a clarification from the party’s honorary president Vijayalakshmi on whether the party stands for Telangana state or not. Since she could not convince them, they decided to quit the party.

The development has left the Congress party in a glee as one of the major factor behind its Telangana gamble was to neutralise YSRCP and expose it as a Rayalaseema party.

Students from Osmania University tried to lay siege to the YSRCP headquarters in Hyderabad. They shouted slogans condemning the party for the resignation of its MLAs. The police took the students in to custody.

Speculation

As details of a proposed Telangana state were not clear and speculations were on whether the state will be limited to ten districts of Telangana or two districts of Rayalseema will also be merged with it, the TRS has not made up its mind about the future course of action. It has made it clear that it will not accept anything other than Telangana of ten districts with Hyderabad as its capital and opposed the idea of Rayala Telangana.

Ever since Congress launched the fresh process on Telangana, party president N Chandrababu Naidu has been silent and has become media shy. He reportedly told his party leaders not to speak on the Telangana issue until the Congress central leadership announces its stand.

While TDP leaders of Telangana were happy over indications of a separate state becoming a reality, their counterparts in Andhra and Rayalaseema were facing anger from the people. The supporters of united Andhra Pradesh laid siege to the residence of senior party leader P Keshav in Anantapur demanding his resignation. He assured the protesters that he will announce his decision after the Congress working Committee announces its stand.

Meanwhile, amid the growing tension in Andhra and Rayalaseema, anti Telangana Samaikhya Andhra students Joint Action Committee wrote a letter to Sonia Gandhi demanding that the unity of the state should be preserved. “You are trying to divide the Telugu brothers just to make Rahul Gandhi the next Prime Minister”, wrote L Govinda Rao, leader of the JAC.

The leaders of Telangana Joint Action Committee met the TRS President K Chandrasekhar Rao in Hyderabad in the backdrop of UPA coordination committee meeting on Wednesday. Convenor Prof Kodanda Ram and others were among those who met Rao to discuss the situation.