Thaindian News

New Delhi, Oct 8 (IANS) Prime Minister Manmohan Singh met Andhra Pradesh Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan in New Delhi Saturday as part of hectic consultations on the Telangana issue, with the agitation for a separate state growing intense by the day.

Manmohan Singh will also meet Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy in the national capital Saturday, officials said.

The prime minister is also likely to hold a meeting of his senior ministers Saturday, sources added.

Reddy, who arrived in New Delhi in the morning, is to meet the main negotiator, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, and other Congress leaders, sources said.

The meetings come in the wake of the agitation for a separate state of Telangana, which has hit normal life in the region for the past 26 days. The Joint Action Committee has threatened a three-day “rail roko” stir from Sunday.

Narasimhan is learnt to have given details to the prime minister about the ground situation in Telangana.

Earlier in the morning, Narasimhan met Home Minister P. Chidambaram and submitted a report on the situation in agitation-hit Telangana.

Mukherjee, who held separate meetings with Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi Friday, had said the government needed “more time” for further consultations on the issue.

Manmohan Singh had met Telangana Rashtra Samithi chief K. Chandrasekhara Rao and Congress leaders from the region last week. He too said the government needed to hold more consultations.