KCR and Chandrababu Naidu to meet to resolve bifurcation issues

Hyderabad: After a long gap, Chief Ministers of the two Telugu states K. Chandrasekhar Rao and N Chandrababu Naidu, will attend a meeting with Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan on Monday, and discuss several pending issues related to state bifurcation apart from handing over of AP Secretariat buildings and Assembly buildings located in Hyderabad to the TS government.

According to sources, the two CMs are likely to discuss the sharing of properties and liabilities of institutions listed in Schedules IX and X, apart from division of power and Secretariat employees.

Mr Narasimhan has held discussions on these issues with ministers of both the states thrice in the past.  The ministers of both states left the final decision on these issues to the CMs of their respective states.  Keeping this in view, the Governor is holding a meeting with both the CMs.

Though three years have passed since bifurcation of AP, there are still several issues that are unresolved. Regarding sharing of assets and liabilities of Schedule IX and X institutions, the Central government held discussions with representatives of both the states several times but the two states could not reach an agreement.

Regarding the AP Secretariat and Assembly buildings and official quarters allotted to the AP government after state bifurcation, they now lie vacant as the AP Secretariat and Heads of the Department have shifted to AP capital region from Hyderabad.

The TS government has requested the AP government to hand over the AP Secretariat and other buildings but AP government is linking these issues with sharing of assets of Schedules IX and X institutions.

Both CMs have publicly announced that they will cooperate and resolve these issues. However, when it comes to implementation, the two CMs are taking opposing stands.

On the power issue AP is demanding TS government to pay about Rs 3,000 crore arrears for the power it has supplied. TS is making a counter demand, saying that the AP government has to clear the arrears it owes to Singareni Collieries for supplying coal for AP’s thermal power plants.