Hyderabad: Amid continuing speculation about the prospect of early elections to the Telangana legislative assembly, state Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR) met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi on Saturday.

The meeting at the prime minister’s residence lasted about 20 minutes. According to official sources, KCR raised several pending issues relating to Telangana and sought the PM’s intervention for their early resolution. He sought the federal government’s nod for a new zonal system in Telangana to facilitate expeditious recruitment to government jobs.

The other pending issues which came up for discussion include transfer of defence land for the construction of a new state secretariat building in Secunderabad, clearance to the pending Backward Classes reservation amendment bill to give 12 per cent reservations to Muslims and the scheduled tribes, setting up central schools in the newly created districts, separate High Court for Telangana, and sanctioning Indian Institute of Management and an Indian Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) for the state.

Sources said that the chief minister drew the attention of the prime minister to the lack of response from various federal ministries to pending demands of the state despite his earlier two representations to him.

This was the third meeting of KCR with Modi in the last two months.

The chief minister, who left for New Delhi on Friday evening, will stay for another couple of days and meet other union ministers including home minister Rajnath Singh, sources added.

KCR’s frequent meetings with the prime minister were being seen as an indication of growing proximity between the TRS and the BJP and their close coordination on the issue of advancing the elections to the state assembly.

Sources said that the issue of early elections also figured in today’s meeting as KCR was keen to have assembly elections by the end of the year. Sources said that KCR was trying to take Modi into confidence and enlist his support for the idea.

Speculation has been rife that KCR would push for the dissolution of the assembly in September to pave the way for elections along with the elections in the three BJP-ruled states of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.

Before boarding the special aircraft last evening, KCR also addressed the joint meeting of TRS legislature party, parliamentary party and the state committee where he exuded confidence that the TRS will return to power by winning 101 of the 119 assembly seats. Quoting his various surveys, KCR said that even in the remaining seats, the margin between the ruling and opposition parties will be very narrow in ten seats. The meeting authorised KCR to take a final decision on early polls and KCR told them that he will spell out his plans soon.