No promise from PM, Telangana agitation to intensify: TRS

After failing to get any assurance from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh over a separate Telangana state, Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) chief K. Chandrasekhar Rao Monday rejected his appeal to call off the strike and decided to intensify the agitation.
KCR, as Rao is popularly known, told reporters that he may also go on a 'fast unto death' to intensify the movement for a separate state.
'The strike will not be called off under any circumstances,' he told reporters after meeting the prime minister in New Delhi. 'The strike would continue till there is a roadmap for separate Telangana,' he added.
The public agitation called by Telangana Joint Action Committee (JAC) to press for a Telangana state in Andhra Pradesh entered its 21st day Monday.
'We are not satisfied. The prime minister did not give any assurance. We will continue to fight,' said the MP, who was leading a delegation of JAC leaders.
The delegation urged the prime minister to direct the state government to pay salaries to striking employees on humanitarian grounds. It also complained that the government was deliberately resorting to power blackouts for farmers in Telangana and using repressive methods against the leaders of Telangana movement.
The TRS chief, who also met Bharatiya Janata Party leader and Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj and Communist Party of India general secretary A. B. Bardhan, accused Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy of misleading the people on the issue.
The prime minister's meeting with the TRS chief comes amidst talk in political circles that the Congress is diluting its position on the half-century old dispute and may move towards a solution without losing political face.
Earlier, the prime minister met a delegation of Congress MPs and legislators from the Andhra Pradesh region but did not give any assurance to them.
During the 30-minute meeting, the Congress delegation told the prime minister that the central government should announce a time-frame for arriving at a decision on the issue, an MP, who was in the delegation, told IANS.
Manmohan Singh told the Congress MPs that his government will make all efforts to find a solution to the long-standing demand.
He said that he would talk to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and place their demands before the Congress core committee.
The delegation is also learnt to have complained against Andhra Pradesh chief minister's hostile stand to the Telangana demand.
Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, who is in charge of Congress affairs in Andhra Pradesh, had Friday submitted a detailed report on the volatile situation in the state to Sonia Gandhi.
The report had recommended further consultations on the Telangana issue. That was endorsed by the Congress core group, which met Friday.
The TRS chief, who has been camping in Delhi, Sunday held a sit-in at Rajghat here in support of his party's demand for the creation of a new Telangana state.