Date:22/04/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/04/22/stories/2007042210690400.htm

Andhra Pradesh - Anantapur

Congress MP unhappy with bandh call

Staff Reporter

ANANTAPUR: Differences in the Congress on handling of Babli issue were out in the open on Saturday. Anantapur MP A. Venkatarami Reddy was critical of the bandh observed in North Telangana districts on Saturday, in response to a call given by APCC president K. Keshava Rao and other senior party leaders in the region.

`Hasty act'

Talking to newspersons here the three-time MP termed the bandh as "an act in haste".

Babli was not just an issue concerning North Telangana or the State. It concerned the entire country, particularly the lower riparian States, he said. It was an issue of upper riparian States overlooking and neglecting the concerns of lower riparian States, he added.

He also took a dig at TDP president N. Chandrababu Naidu on the issue. Mr. Reddy felt that if the previous NDA Government at the Centre and TDP in State had taken up disputes regarding Almatti, Upper Tunga and Paragodu and stopped their completion, no upper riparian State would have dared repeat such mistakes.