Hyderabad, January 17: “IT is only a question of time when Telangana will become a reality. If not today, it will happen in six months. But Telangana will have to be formed,” Telangana Rashtra Samiti chief K Chandrasekhara Rao said while addressing a group of ex-servicemen at his party office, Telangana Bhavan, here today.
The TRS chief wondered why Congress leaders were afraid of resigning from their positions. “Some of them ask if Telangana will come into being if they resign. I am telling them: Do it and it will happen,” he said and promised them that he would ensure that they would get re-elected with a thumping margin. “What are you afraid of? I have resigned several times and won again in byelections. What is holding you back?” Going by their track record, TRS chief said, the Telangana Congress leaders’s ability to espouse the Telangana cause is suspect. “I doubt whether they will be able to preserve Telangana after formation. These people, who are unable to get Telangana in the first place, will be equally inefficient in preserving it too,’’ he said.
Rao said that he was also thinking of a post-Telangana scenario and of improving the living standards of various sections of society. “Achieving statehood is one thing and and protecting it is another. We should be careful enough to see that Telagnana develops on all fronts.” He said Telangana had been at the receiving end all the time. “When I was in the central cabinet I tried to have Telangana freedom fighters recognised officially for government benefits. I gave a list of 10,000 freedom fighters but only 5,000 of them had been recognised,” he said and wondered why Telangana leaders were unable to strive even for pension for Telangana freedom fighters.
He said there was no justification for deployment of central forces in Telangana. “They wanted to have a repeat of 1969 _ crushing the movement with bullets. They had expected a major breakdown of law and order, and wanted to crush it but nothing of the sort happened,” he said, adding: “Ours is not a street fight but a straight fight.” He said the TRS was adopting different strategies at different times to make the Centre feel the heat. “We are moving with a strategy. Silence sometimes is also tactically necessary. The net result of the strategy will be that the Centre would find the pressure on it unbearable and decide to deliver Telangana.’’
–Agencies