People's Front urges Telangana Governor to treat it as single entity

A day before the counting of votes in Telangana, the Congress-led People's Front on Monday urged the Governor to treat it as a single entity and invite it to form the government in case it gets the maximum number of seats.

A delegation of leaders of the Congress, the Telugu Desam Party (TDP), the Telangana Jana Samithi (TJS) and the Communist Party of India (CPI) called on Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan and submitted a memorandum urging him not to invite the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) to form the government even if it gets more seats than the Congress party in the event of the results throwing up a hung Assembly.

Congress party's Telangana unit President Uttam Kumar Reddy told reporters after meeting the Governor that they requested him to treat the People's Front as a single entity.

He said the four parties entered into an alliance before the elections and contested the polls with a common minimum programme. The parties also submitted the relevant records to the Governor.

Reddy said they brought to Narasimhan's notice that the Supreme Court in its judgements on various occasions had observed that a pre-poll alliance should be treated as a single entity.

The Congress leader said they made the representation as a precautionary measure in view of the attempts by some parties to form a post-poll alliance.

The People's Front leaders said they also urged the Governor to ensure that after the results were announced the newly-elected legislators get adequate security.

Congress sources said they called on the Governor in view of the recent experiences in Goa and Karnataka, where the governors invited the single largest party to form the government.

The delegation included the TDP's Telangana unit chief L. Ramna, TJS President M. Kodandaram and Congress Working President Mohammad Azharuddin.

--IANS

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