The Lok Satta Party President underlined the need for the Telangana and Andhra Pradesh governments to work together for a bright future for their peoples.
Conveying his good wishes for the happiness and prosperity of the 3.5-crore Telangana people following the formation of a separate State, Loksatta Party national President Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan today pledged to extend constructive cooperation to the new Government headed by TRS President K Chandrasekhara Rao.
Underlining the need for the Telangana and Andhra Pradesh governments working together to ensure a bright future for their youth, JP said at a media conference that a geographical division on a map is not going to obliterate their common civilization and culture, language, literature and history.
Celebrating the formation of Telangana at the party headquarters, JP hoisted the national tricolor, and Bandaru Ramamohan Rao the party flag, after offering floral tributes to the portraits of B R Ambedkar and Mahatma Gandhi.
JP said that formation of Telangana has opened a new era in the Telugu people's history. It marked the culmination of sacrifices made by hundreds of people for decades, he stated.
He recalled that the Loksatta Party had declared unequivocally in the Assembly that the formation of a Telangana State was necessary and inevitable. And it had had the distinction of laying the foundation for a bright future for the people of the two States.
The recent general elections once again demonstrated that the Indian people are mature enough to elect stable Governments, JP remarked. The Constitution which had preserved unity amidst complex diversity in the country had also facilitated the formation of Telangana.
Describing himself as an eternal optimist, JP hoped the two States would be at the forefront of economic development in the country in the next decade. Members of Parliament belonging to the two States should fight together to preserve and promote the Telugu people's interests, he averred.
The two governments would need to maintain cordial and amicable relations and have a healthy competition. If they followed the policy of "an eye for an eye", both would go blind, and other States would march ahead of them, he counselled.
There might be hiccups between the two States initially over division of river waters, financial resources, employees etc., but such problems were not intractable, he opined. In fact, they were trivial when compared to the challenges the two governments faced in living up to their people's expectations.
The two governments would need to focus on improving infrastructure including power supply, attracting investments, promoting manufacturing, decentralizing power and providing good education and skills to youth, and not on offering short-term sops to cling on to power, he said.
JP referred to the absence of Andhra Pradesh leaders at the swearing-in ceremony of K Chandrasekhara Rao as Telangana Chief Minister, and hoped that such mistakes would not be repeated in future.
Party leaders Katari Srinivasa Rao, P Ravi Maruth, P R Rao and Geetha Murthy took part in the media conference. (INN)