New Delhi, October 29: The Congress Core Group on Friday reviewed the continuing Telangana crisis and discussed electoral reforms the United Progressive Alliance government hopes to introduce in the winter session of Parliament.
Apart from the Core Group members — Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Defence Minister A.K. Antony, Home Minister P. Chidambaram, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and her political secretary Ahmed Patel — there were two special invitees, Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad and Law Minister Salman Khursheed, informed sources said.
Mr. Azad, in his capacity as Congress general secretary in-charge of Andhra Pradesh, briefed the Core Group on the ground realities in the embattled Telangana region, while Mr. Khursheed explained the electoral reforms his Ministry had been working on ahead of a proposed all-party meeting.
Friday’s meeting, at the residence of the Prime Minister here, comes against the backdrop of the strike by government employees, which had paralysed Telangana, winding to an end. Caught between the demand for a separate State by the votaries of Telangana and the plea for the continuance of a unified State from the rest of Andhra Pradesh, the UPA government, the sources said, now wants to consult its electoral partners before taking the next step.
Meanwhile, with the need to bring about electoral reforms acquiring certain urgency after Anna Hazare made a plea for the Right to Recall, the Law Ministry has been hard at work.
So, even though the government’s view — endorsed by CEC S.Y. Quraishi — is that the Right to Recall is impractical, a slew of other reforms are being contemplated.
The reforms on the anvil include making it harder for those with criminal cases to contest elections, and limited state funding for women, SC and ST candidates of recognised parties provided they fall within a prescribed income bracket.
–Agencies