TDP steals a march on Congress

HYDERABAD: In a bid to steal a march on the Telangana Congress legislators, the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) MLAs from the Telangana region put in their papers even before the ruling Congress MLAs submitted their resignations on Monday. Till Sunday, the Telangana Telugu Desam Forum had been reiterating that the party MLAs would tender their resignations only after the Congress legislators did so.The TDP has 37 MLAs in Telangana. Its four rebel MLAs submitted their resignations yesterday itself. Thirty MLAs personally tendered their regignations to the deputy Speaker while three faxed their papers from the US.The TDP MLAs reached the Assembly first after paying tributes to martyrs at Gun Park. Having learnt that the Congress MLAs had assembled at K Jana Reddy’s residence and were still in a dilemma whether to submit their resignations, the TDP leaders proceeded to the deputy speaker’s chamber and put in their papers.“The astrologer fixed 12 noon as the muhuratham to submit our resignations. But when we heard that the Congress MLAs were in a dilemma we went ahead with the resignations according to the muhurtham and also to put pressure on the Congress,” a TDP MLA told Express.Telangana Telugu Desam Forum (TTDF) convenor E Dayakar Rao said they did not want to go for by-elections. “Our resignations should help create a constitutional crisis and the Centre should come down and  concede the demand for a separate Telangana state,” Dayakar Rao said.“All other parties have targeted TDP till now. We have submitted our resignations first and proved our commitment to the Telangana cause. The government should collapse now,” TDP MLA D Anasuya said.