Hyderabad:
Congress leaders from Telangana region cancelled their planned trip to New Delhi on Tuesday, after the party high command took a serious view of the issue and issued a stern warning against such plans.
Congress general secretary and Union Law Minister M Veerappa Moily said that the Centre would soon announce its decision on Telangana statehood and asked party leaders from the region not to visit the national Capital.
Following this, the Congress ministers, MLAs and MLCs from Telangana cancelled their Delhi trip. Two senior MLAs K Jana Reddy and R Damodar Reddy, who had already reached Delhi, returned to Hyderabad on the high command's directive.
The Telangana Congress leaders wanted to apply pressure on the party high command on the statehood issue by meeting the top leaders in Delhi. They also wanted to announce their resolve to resign from their posts as they were under immense pressure from the Joint Action Committee as well as local people.
Moily, however, said resignations would not solve the problem but would rather aggravate it. "If you people resign, the assembly will get dissolved. Then the Telangana issue will get indefinitely postponed as there can be no consultations without the assembly in place," Moily reportedly told his party leaders.
He also warned them that the statehood issue would get further complicated if leaders from all the regions came and lobbied in Delhi.