Former SP leader and Rajya Sabha member Amar Singh will now lead a movement for the creation of six new states in the country.
The National Federation for News States (NFNS) — a group of outfits demanding separate states namely, Bundelkhand, Telangana, Vidharbha, Purvanchal, Gorkhaland and Harit Pradesh — on Monday announced that Mr Singh would lead the federation as its chairman.
A proposal to this effect was moved by Mr Raja Bundela who heads the Bundelkhand Mukti Morcha and seconded by Mr P. Niroop Reddy of the Telangana Vikas Kendra.
Talking to reporters on the occasion, Mr Amar Singh said that the Centre and the concerned states had been playing billiards on the issue for several years now. “The centre and the state are simply pushing one ball to another and to another. We have had enough of this and we are now determined to play football and kick the ball straight into the goal. We will no longer accept the policy of management by postponement which major political parties have been doing till now,” he said.
Mr Singh, who is now leading the campaign for Purvanchal, said that the demand for six new states had risen from severe developmental imbalances, apart from cultural, social, economic and linguistic affinity.
“Electricity is produced in Purvanchal but used in Sefai and Badalpur (the native villages of Mulayam Singh Yadav and Mayawati respectively). Vidharbha produces cotton but its farmers are driven to suicide. Bundelkhand craves for a drop of water. Is this not reason enough that these regions should be granted statehood and allowed to develop themselves? After all, Chhattisgarh, today, is more developed than Madhya Pradesh,” he explained.
Questioning the silence of UP chief minister Mayawati who has agreed in principle for the trifurcation of Uttar Pradesh, Mr Amar Singh said that if the state government passed a resolution for trifurcation of the state, it would mount more pressure on the Centre.
“We wanted to meet the chief minister — or even her officials — and hand over a memorandum, but we have not been given an appointment,” he said.
Meanwhile, Mr Raja Bundela , convenor of the NFNS, told reporters that the federation would not seek setting up of State Reorganisation Commission since that would mean postponement of the issue by another five years.
“We have no intentions of giving a violent turn to our respective movements but we will not rest until we achieve statehood for our regions.
Representatives of Telangana, Gorkhaland, Vidharbha, Bundelkhand, Purvanchal and Harit Pradesh attended the one day conference that resolved to intensify their respective movement collectively in the coming weeks.