Hyderabad: The Congress govt has decided to convene an all-party meeting to discuss the Centre’s proposed delimitation exercise, which poses the threat of impending loss to Telangana and other south Indian states. The meeting will also chalk out an action plan to take up the issue with the Union govt.
Deputy chief minister Bhatti Vikramarka on Wednesday said he, along with party veteran K Jana Reddy, would write letters to all political parties in the state and invite them for the all-party meeting, the date and venue of which will be announced shortly. “If required, we will personally meet the respective chiefs and invite them to the all-party meeting on the crucial issue of delimitation,” Bhatti said.
Recently, the cabinet has approved that the govt should call for an all-party meeting on the contentious issue of delimitation of the Lok Sabha constituencies. Bhatti said Telangana would lose out if the delimitation was carried out on the basis of population.
Chief minister A Revanth Reddy, on several occasions, voiced his concerns over the delimitation exercise resulting in reducing representation of south Indian states in Parliament if it was taken up on population basis. Interestingly, the CM recently pointed out that the south Indian states would stand to lose even if the delimitation was taken up on a pro-rata basis. The CM also demanded that the central govt should convene an all-party meeting on the delimitation exercise.
Tamil Nadu chief minister MK Stalin had already conducted an all-party meeting in his state and announced that his ministers and important leaders would reach out to all the chief ministers and party presidents in south India and other states to invite them for an all-party meeting to be held soon on the delimitation exercise.
In Telangana, while Congress has been openly raising concerns about the exercise, even the main opposition BRS, with its working president K T Rama Rao, opposed the delimitation exercise on population basis.