Four more parliament members and 16 legislators from Andhra Pradesh's Telangana region resigned on Tuesday to step up pressure on the central government to carve out a separate state.
Intensifying the movement for a separate state of Telangana, parliament members of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) and the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) have submitted their resignations.
While TRS chief K. Chandrasekhara Rao and his colleague Vijayashanti faxed their resignations to Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar, TDP MPs N. Nageswar Rao and Ramesh Rathore tendered their resignations in New Delhi.
With this, the number of MPs who have resigned since Monday has gone up to 14.
KCR, as the TRS chief is popularly known, and Vijayashanti said they would soon visit Delhi to personally meet and request Speaker Meira Kumar to accept their resignations.
Nine Lok Sabha members and one Rajya Sabha member of the Congress party tendered their resignations on Monday.
Meanwhile, 16 more members of the assembly, including a minister, have also submitted their resignations the state assembly speaker.
State Minister for Textiles Shankar Rao, who was initially reluctant to quit, faxed his resignation to the speaker from the US.
All 11 members of assembly belonging to the TRS and all four of the Communist Party of India (CPI) have also quit. They handed over their resignations to legislature secretary as both the speaker and the deputy speaker were not available.
With their resignations, the total number of legislators who have quit has gone up to 96. Telangana accounts for 119 members in 294-member assembly.
The members of assembly who have resigned include 40 of the ruling Congress party, all 37 of the TDP, both members of the Praja Rajyam Party (PRP), and three associate members of the Congress.
A total of 82 members of the state assembly, including 11 ministers, had submitted their resignations on Monday.
Both legislators of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are also likely to quit Tuesday evening.
Three members of the legislative council also quit on Tuesday. As many as 12 members of the council had submitted their resignations on Monday.
The numbers are play
So, how will the resignations, if accepted, affect the Congress party's standing in Andhra Pradesh.
Here are the numbers.
In the 294-member AP assembly, the Congress, joined by the Praja Rajyam Party, has a combined strength of 173. The Telugu Desam party has 90 members, the Telangana Rashtra Samiti has 11 and others bring up 20.
On Monday, 35 Congress MLAs and 37 TDP babus from the Telangana region resigned and if their resignations are accepted the functioning strength of the Assembly will come down to 222 - 111 being the halfway mark.
The congress and PRP - even after the 35 resignations - will enjoy majority in the House with 138 MLAs and the TDP will have 53 members - strength of TRS and others will remain same.
According to latest reports, two MPs have submitted their resignations today.