T-Committee Meets KCR, Vijayasanthi

The Justice B N Srikrishna committee began its core work on Friday. It will hold discussions within the entire state of Andhra Pradesh, and work to obtain view points over the statehood of Telangana.

Assembling at the Vigyan Bhawan in Delhi at 11:15 am on Friday, the Srikrishna committee began its deliberations with K Chandrasekhar Rao, the chief of Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS). KCR was accompanied by party MP & former head of the now-defunct party Talli Telangana, Vijayasanti, along with TRS party ideologue C Jaishankar. The TRS, which was set up in 2001 with a single-point agenda of obtaining the state of Telangana, had submitted a 1,400-page 4-volume report to the Srikrishna committee on April 7, citing various aspects in support of the statehood demand.

In his 2-hour presentation to the Committee, KCR has reportedly said that any delay in the creation of Telangana may lead to a "civil war". On the whole, the TRS met with the panel for about 5 hours. Justice Srikrishna expressed satisfaction at the proceedings with TRS today and said that, if required, meetings will be held in July again.

Set up by the government on February 3, 2010, the Srikrishna committee has, in the words of Union Home Minister P Chidambaram, 18 months to "deliberate on the mechanism and lay down a road map for consultations on the Telangana issue". The committee is headed by the former Supreme Court judge, Justice B N Srikrishna, who also headed the well-known Commission Of Inquiry - the "Srikrishna Commission" as it is known now - investigating the causes for the Bombay riots of 1992-93.

The 5-member committee will be in Hyderabad for two days, beginning from Apr 22, to hear the views of some political parties in this regard.