HYDERABAD: Are Telangana Congress MPs slipping on the resignation issue? A majority of them are believed to have been cajoled by the high command that they should wait for its decision on the statehood and not make any noise in the meanwhile.The party leadership is not happy with the MPs setting deadlines to the party leadership which it considers is nothing but trying to hurry them into taking a decision.All the 11 Lok Sabha members (excluding petroleum minister S Jaipal Reddy) and four Rajya Sabha members (excluding INTUC leader G Sanjeeva Reddy) are under pressure from the Congress high command not to create any ruckus on the issue. The result is that half of the Telangana MPs are ready to obey the party high command’s orders on the contentious issue. Some of them are already on the job of lobbying to get a berth in the central cabinet when its expansion takes place. The other MPs do not want to embarrass the party by resorting to action but will be making a statement or two on how committed they are to the cause and that they are ready for any sacrifice.The change in the attitude of the MPs has become perceptible after they met party core committee members Pranab Mukherjee, AK Antony, P Chidambaram and Ahmed Patel on June 15 and 16. The MPs, who had earlier created a din that they would launch an indefinite fast from July 5, are now saying that they have not announced anything officially while some MPs have suddenly gone silent on the issue itself. Recently, when some T-activists insisted that MP G Vivek resign, he shot back saying: “Why should we quit at this juncture?” Anyhow, a final decision on their future action programme which includes hunger strike and resignation will be taken at their next meeting here on July 1. According to one MP who does not want to be named, the Telangana MPs will face physical attacks as witnessed in Warangal (where MP S Rajaiah was manhandled) and will lose people’s confidence if they go back on their proposed action programme. At the same time, they are not ready to hurt the party high command either. As for other MPs, senior leader V Hanumantha Rao and Malkajgiri MP Sarve Satyanarayana are aspiring central cabinet berths. Those who are in the forefront of the separate statehood at least till now are Karimnagar MP Ponnam Prabhakar, MPs Balaram Naik and S Rajaiah.
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