The much-talked about committee to examine the demand for separate Telangana will be announced next week, Home Minister P Chidamabaram said on Thursday.
"We are almost at the end of concluding that exercise. If all goes well, we should have a committee by the end of this week. We will announce the committee by next week," he told reporters declining to give out the names.
The Home Minister said the government would have more or less finalised the names and will do by the end of this week. "Perhaps by the next week, the committee will be announced," he said.
Chidambaram in the meeting with political parties from Andhra Pradesh on January 5 had said that its agenda was to "deliberate on the mechanism and lay down a road map for consultations" on the Telangana issue.
The meeting followed Chidambaram's statement on December 23, 2009 when the government put on back burner the formation of the separate state for which it had on December 9, 2009 promised to initiate the process.
On law and order situation in Andhra Pradesh, the Home Minister said much of the agitation has cooled down while there are some protests here and there.
"My greatest regret is that a couple of students reportedly committed suicide. That, I think, should have been completely avoided. Why should children commit suicide. Parents, teachers have responsibility to stop this. But keeping that apart, by and large, things are peaceful there. There is no major law and order violation. We are sticking to our words," he said.AP
The Joint Action Committee of political parties on Telangana on Thursday reacted sharply to Home Minister P Chidambaram's statement that the Committee to go into the issue would be announced next week.
"Nothing concrete has been said. Nothing short of a clear time frame will satisfy us. People of Talangana want a clear time frame for the formation Telangana state," Convener of the all-party Joint Action Committee (JAC) Prof Kodandaram told PTI. He said the future course of action of the JAC will be decided in a meeting later in the day.
Expressing fear that the proposed committee to look into the formation of Telangana may be used as a delaying tactic, BJP today said the government should set a time frame for it and also bring a Bill on the issue during the forthcoming budget session of Parliament.
"BJP has a firm view on formation of separate state of Telangana and feels this process should be completed in the ensuing budget session of Parliament by bringing a Bill on the issue," party spokesperson Prakash Javadekar said in New Delhi. BJP would support the Bill if it was moved in Parliament, he added.
The BJP MP warned the government not to use the proposed committee on formation of Telangana to sit over the demand. Home Minister P Chidambaram today announced that this committee would be formed by next week.
"We do not want the government to use this committee as an excuse for delaying formation of Telangana.... delay is not good. There should be a time frame for the committee and the process should be completed in a time-bound manner," Javadekar said. He insisted that a separate Telangana state was viable and can co-exist peacefully with Andhra Pradesh and both states can progress together.
BJP has all along supported formation of Telangana with Hyderabad as the capital of the new state. PTI
