Jaipal says he played trump card for separate State

Pointing out that it was the Congress that conceded Telangana people’s desire and carved out separate Telangana State, Congress senior leader and former Union Minister S Jaipal Reddy said he had taken a pivotal role of uniting Telangana Congress MPs for achieving statehood for Telangana State.

Speaking to the media at Gandhi Bhavan here on Wednesday, Jaipal Reddy made it clear that the formation of Telangana State would not have been possible had he not resigned from the Union Cabinet for pressing the party high command to concede the Telangana people’s desire. He also revealed that he had rejected offers of making him chief minister of then united Andhra Pradesh just for the sake of separate Telangana State. He charged Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao with criticizing the Congress due to fear of defeat in the Warangal parliamentary by-election.

Alleging that Chandrasekhar Rao came to power through false campaigning, Jaipal Reddy said everybody knew how KCR continued hunger strike then. “KCR never gave an explanation as to why he withdrew his hunger strike and continued it with the fear of pressure mounted by public organizations then”, he pointed out. He said the Telangana people know very well that formation of Telangana State was possible with only Congress. Stating that he didn’t resign from Union cabinet as part of Telangana movement, Jaipal Reddy made it clear that the creation of separate Telangana State with Hyderabad city as capital would not have been possible had he did not quit the Union cabinet.

It may recalled here that the Chief Minister criticised Jaipal Reddy on Tuesday at an election meeting at Warangal that everybody knows how Jaipal Reddy enjoyed a berth in then Union cabinet from 2004 to 2014 and it was not proper to question him where was KCR during Sakala Janula Samme. KCR had also asked the people to teach a fitting lesson to Jaipal Reddy, who was spreading falsehood in Warangal election. (NSS)