KCR resigns from Lok Sabha on Telangana; Azad meets PM, Sonia

Hyderabad/New Delhi, Jul 5 (PTI) The campaign for
separate Telangana snowballed Tuesday with Telangana Rashtra
Samiti (TRS) chief K Chandrashekar Rao resigning his Lok
Sabha(Lower House of Parliament) seat as the number of MLAs
from the region quitting the Andhra Pradesh Assembly touched
the 100 mark.
Concerned over the development, Union Minister and
Congress in-charge for south Indian state Andhra Pradesh
Ghulam Nabi Azad Tuesday met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and
party chief Sonia Gandhi and conveyed to them the sentiments
of the lawmakers from the Telangana region.
Azad said the Members of Legislative Assembly (MLAs)
and Members of Parliament (MPs) are "open to discussions" and
that the Centre should start discussions on the issue and
"those who have resigned have not closed their doors."
Rao, whose Telangana Rashtrya Samithi is spearheading
the statehood movement, and his colleague and actor Vijaya
Shanti faxed their resignations from Lok Sabha to Speaker
Meira Kumar, while two Telugu Desam Party (TDP) MPs -- Nama
Nageswara Rao and Ramesh Rathod -- met her in New Delhi and
put in their papers.
100 of the total 119 legislators from the Telangana
region have resigned since Monday with more MLAs of
Congress, TDP and all 11 legislators of the TRS quitting
today. Four members of Communist Party of India (CPI) and two
from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) also resigned from the
Assembly.
With this, the total number of Congress legislators
who have resigned has risen to 42, including two from actor
Chiranjeevi's Praja Rajyam Party. All 37 TDP MLAs from the
region have resigned.
Ten members from Congress, including Deputy Chief
Minister Damodar Rajanarashima, seven MIM MLAs and one each
from Lok Satta and Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M)
have not resigned.