Fight for Telangana: Fresh complaints lodged against union ministers, Sonia Gandhi

In a petition filed before the Malkajgiri court of Ranga Reddy district, BJP's State Executive Committee member Satish Agarwal said the Congress had, in its manifesto before the 2004 general elections, promised to carve a separate Telangana state out of Andhra Pradesh.

Even Sonia Gandhi had promised Telangana at a public meeting in Karimnagar district during an election campaign in 2004, he said. But despite the Congress coming to power, announcing a decision on creating a Telangana state was still being prolonged, the BJP leader said.

The Congress leaders gave a commitment on the demand for a Telangana state but the promise has not been fulfilled, he said in the petition and alleged only Sonia Gandhi was responsible for the delay in not granting statehood to the region, which in turn resulted in a spate of suicides there.

Congress MPs and MLAs now support creating a Telangana state, he claimed, and accused Gandhi of delaying an announcement on Telangana. He claimed the delay forces the region's youth to commit suicide and sought the court to issue a direction to the police to register of a case under cheating and other relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code against the UPA chairperson.

The court will hear the matter tomorrow.

In a related development, the 11th Metropolitan Magistrate Court in Ranga Reddy district asked Chaitanyapuri police today to investigate another complaint against the union ministers and senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad, which alleges that they cheated people of the region by going back on their statements over the Telangana statehood demand. Meanwhile, the Chaitanyapuri police said they were yet to get a copy of the court orders in this regard.

Based on a private complaint filed by a practicing advocate Madhu Kumar, the court asked the police to investigate the matter and submit a status report by February

28.

Shinde, who had set a one-month deadline for a decision in December 2012, said on January 27 that the consultation process on Telangana issue was underway.

On December 28, 2012, Shinde had said the Centre would announce a decision on the contentious issue in a month.

On December 9, 2009, the then Union Home Minister Chidambaram had announced that the process to create a Telangana state would be initiated by moving a resolution in the state assembly.

However, as protests mounted against the proposed bifurcation of the state in coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema regions, Chidambaram had said on December 23, 2009, that the Centre wanted to consider "all views" on the demand for Telangana state and that "peace and tranquility should be maintained".

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