Hyderabad, December 07: The Congress High Command is likely to intervene later today to persuade Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) President K Chandrasekhara Rao (KCR) to call off his nine day-old fast-unto-death, at the Nizam’s Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS).
Union Law Minister M Veerappa Moily, incharge of Andhra Pradesh affairs, reportedly called Chief Minister K Rosaiah this afternoon for an update on the situation, amidst reports of continuing violence in Osmania University campus.
The state Human Rights Commission (SHRC) also intervened, sending its representative to verify whether its Orders restraining the police had been violated even as the Joint Action Committee (JAC) of Students Unions alleged that police lathicharged ”peaceful” protestors earlier in the day.
The Congress High Command, wary of the separate Telangana agitation taking a violent turn, is likely to assign Mr Ahmed Patel, the political secretary of Congress President Sonia Gandhi, as an interlocutor to break the logjam created by the TRS President’s fast.
Briefed by the intelligence agencies on the possible infiltration of undesirable elements, including fundamentalists and far left, the state government, at the behest of the Centre, wants to isolate the militant group at the earliest. ”Hardly ten per cent of the students who wanted the violent route. Another 20% are extending moral support for separate Telangana,” top officials in the administration and intelligence said.
There is a possibility of Mr Ahmed Patel calling KCR directly on phone this evening according to a group of Congress partymen. TRS leaders were working in the background to break the ice.
The Bill to exclude police recruitment from the Presidential Order, 1972 on Mulki Rules, is to be placed before the Andhra Pradesh Assembly tomorrow. This was to back the review petition in the Apex Court holding ”Hyderabad as a Free Zone”.
——-Agencies