After the vote-on-account was tabled in both Houses of Parliament on Monday, the focus is back on the Telangana Bill. The Government maintained that it is serious of passing the legislation and it will be taken up for discussion on Tuesday.
The vote-on-account on Railways was passed without any discussion on Monday. Congress sources indicate that on the interim budget, too, a debate will not be possible in both Houses if the issue on Telangana Bill remains unresolved. “We will take up the Telangana Bill on Tuesday. It will be passed in both Houses soon after the Vote-on-Account gets passed,” a senior minister said.
The Congress has already issued a three-line whip to all its MPs to be present in the House this week. The party is confident that as the anti-Telangana MPs are suspended from the House, there will not be much opposition to the Bill. Other Congress MPs from the region—mostly ministers—seem to have satisfied with the offer for a special assistance to the Seemandhra region.
The anti-Telangana group is also active with counter-strategies. They think that even if the Bill gets passed in the Lok Sabha amid din, it could be deferred in the Rajya Sabha as the Government faces a tough task there to ensure its introduction. There were also talks of extending the session for a day or two, but the Opposition is unwilling.
Congress leaders, including Ministers Sushil Kumar Shinde and Jairam ramesh, met Opposition leaders for their support for the Bill. The BJP is learnt to have demanded a discussion. The CPI(M), too, has said it will not allow the passage of the Bill without any discussion.
Meanwhile, YSR Congress Party leader Jaganmohan Reddy held a protest sit-in here against the Congress’s ‘ploy’ to divide the State. He said the Congress’s behaviour was worse than the colonial rule.
The pepper spray episode was a stage-managed event, sponsored by the Congress high command, Reddy said. L Rajagopal, the MP who sprayed pepper spray, received the approval for corporate debt restructuring (CDR) worth ₹8,000 crore for his company recently. “Do you believe if somebody is opposing the Congress party, if somebody is really a rebel to the party, a CDR would happen with the consent of Congress party?” he asked.