Will welcome TRS’ merger with Congress, says Digvijay

Senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh today said he will welcome merger of Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) with his party now that a decision on Telangana has been taken.

“TRS supremo Chandrashekhar Rao has said in the past that if the Congress gives us state of Telangana we would be very happy to merge TRS with the Congress.

“Now that a decision (on granting statehood to Telangana) has been taken, we would welcome TRS’ merger with Congress,” he said.

The Congress General Secretary was talking to reporters outside the Madhya Pradesh Congress office here.

Yesterday, the Congress and UPA gave nod for carving out Telangana state from Andhra Pradesh.

Rao, who formed TRS in 2001, had emerged as the political face of the movement for Telangana statehood.

The TRS leader welcomed the decision to carve out a state of Telangana from Andhra Pradesh.

Asked yesterday about possible merger of his party with Congress, Rao said he alone cannot talk about the issue and that the Bill for formation of separate Telangana needs to be passed in Parliament before the issue could be discussed.

The former Union Minister said the merger issue needs to be discussed within the Politbureau, his party’s key decision-making body, and other party fora.

–PTI