Thaindian News

Hyderabad, Feb 15 (IANS) Shouting “Jai Telangana”, Congress party legislators from the region that Monday tried to disrupt the address of Andhra Pradesh Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan to the joint session of state legislature on the first day of the budget session.
The Congress is in power in Andhra Pradesh, but the demand for a separate Telangana state has created a rift among party legislators.

The legislators who supported the demand for a separate Telangana state continued to shout slogans throughout the governor’s 45-minute speech and later walked out of the assembly.

The legislators of main opposition Telugu Desam Party (TDP) from coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema region — opposing bifurcation of the state — countered them with slogans of “samakhiya Andhra” or unified Andhra.

The TDP legislators from Telangana stayed away from the session to protest terms of reference of Srikrishna panel looking into the statehood demand. They have rejected the terms of reference for being unfavourable to the demand for separate Telangana.

A couple of hours before the session began, speaker N. Kirankumar Reddy accepted the resignations of 12 out of 15 Telangana legislators who had submitted their resignations Sunday.

Resignations of all 10 legislators of TRS and one each of TDP and BJP have been accepted while no decision has been taken on resignations of two legislators of Congress and one of PRP.

Earlier, TDP legislators staged a sit-in at the main entrance of the assembly building to protest the police firing on Osmania University students Sunday night while Congress legislators staged a protest at Gunpark opposite the assembly building.

They also boycotted the customary breakfast hosted by the speaker.

The all-party Joint Action Committee (JAC) has asked all 119 legislators from the region and other elected representatives to quit by Monday evening.