Congress president Sonia Gandhi on 16 April 2014 tried to hijack the full credit for the formation of separate Telangana state. She said that K Chandrasekhar Rao-led Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) and N Chandrababu Naidu-led Telugu Desam Party (TDP) have no role in the process for creation of Telangana state.
Sonia Gandhi was addressing a full-packed election rally at Ambedkar Stadium in Karimnagar in Andhra Pradesh (AP). This was her first public meeting in the Telangana region of AP after the bill on Telangana state was passed in the Parliament.
The new Telangana State will be formed on June 2, 2014, she added.
Attacking TRS, which has gone back on its promise to merge itself with Congress once the bill on Telangana passed in Parliament, Sonia said TRS played no role in the drafting and passage of the bill.
While TRS started the movement for separate Telangana state on 2 April, 2001, 45 MLAs of Congress raised the issue in December 2000 itself by launching a rally, she added.
The Congress president said that even TDP tried to hinder the passage of Telangana bill in the Parliament. And the YSR Congress Party did not miss any chance to halt the bill on Telangana, she said. Reminding martyrdom of Mahatma Gandhi, Indira Gandhi and her husband Rajiv Gandhi for the cause of secularism, Sonia slammed Telugu Desam Party (TDP) for its pre-electoral tie-up with a "communal party" Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Addressing the gathering, she said Congress has fulfilled the 60-year dream of Telanagana people to have a separate state. Thanks to the strong determination of Congress only a new Telangana state is made possible, she said.
Sonia said that the revenue generated from Hyderabad city would go to Telangana only, the new state to be formed on June 2. She also made it clear that Seemandhra, the residual state once Telangana is carved out from AP, would be developed by fulfilling all promises made by Congress party.
