The spectre of President’s rule looms large over Andhra Pradesh in view of the continued logjam in the Assembly over the issue of taking up debate on a draft bill on creation of separate Telangana state.
For the second consecutive day today, the special winter session of the Assembly was adjourned without taking up the much-awaited discussion on the bill as the members opposed to the division of the state stalled the proceedings of the House.
There was ruckus in both the Assembly and the Legislative Council with members from Rayalaseema and Coastal Andhra regions, jointly referred to as Seemandhra, stormed the podium and obstructed the proceedings.
Though President Pranab Mukherjee had sent the draft AP Reorganisation Bill, 2013, to the Assembly on December 12, the debate has not started so far due to turmoil in the House. The Assembly has time till January 23 to send its views to the President on the draft bill.
Going by the bitter regional divide, it is unlikely that there would ever be any meaningful discussion on the bill in near future.
The political circles are agog with speculation that the Centre might be forced to opt for imposition of President’s Rule in the State if the deadlock over the Telangana bill continued.
Significantly, Deputy Chief Minister Damodar Rajanarasimha, a strong votary of Telangana statehood cause and a critic of Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy, told reporters today that there would be “major turn of events” in the state politics after January 10.
Since there is no possibility of any debate on the Telangana bill, the Centre could straightaway introduce the bill in the Parliament during its special session in the first week of February and get it passed, sources close to the Telangana leader said.
Meanwhile, Chief Minister, who is strongly opposed to the bifurcation of the state, remained defiant and contended that there should be voting on the draft bill so that a strong message could be sent to the Centre that a majority of the legislators were opposed to dividing the state.
