Telangana Congress has decided to hold its public meeting at Tukkuguda on the outskirts of the city after the party failed to get permission from the authorities concerned for the two venues it had proposed — Parade Grounds and LB Stadium — in the heart of the city.
The meeting is planned for September 17 evening marking the culmination of the Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting planned from September 16 to 17 where top leaders of the party from across the country will participate. Telangana was chosen as the venue for the CWC meeting after the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) requested the high command to let it host the meeting of the highest decision making body of the Congress party.
AICC general secretary (Organisation) K.C. Venugopal, who was in Hyderabad on Wednesday, finalised the Tukkuguda venue after inspecting several locations for the public meeting where Sonia Gandhi will announce five guarantees to be implemented in Telangana kickstarting the campaigning for the Telangana Assembly elections scheduled in December this year.
Congress plans a massive show with lakhs of people and make the best use of the CWC meeting followed by the public meeting with the entire nation’s attention on the CWC meeting and the crucial decisions it would take in view of the election year.
All three parties — Congress, BJP and the BRS — are sparring over celebrations on September 17, which is a historic day for Telangana as it is the day in 1948 that the Nizam surrendered before the Indian Army after he initially refused to join the Indian Union. The Day is celebrated as the Liberation Day in Telangana but over the years it has taken political colour with the different political parties calling it as an Integration Day and some terming it as the Merger Day.
The ruling Bharat Rashtra Samiti (BRS), during the Telangana agitation, had demanded that it be officially celebrated by the government in the combined Andhra Pradesh as the Liberation Day. However, after coming to power it has decided to call it National Integration Day as the usage of liberation would send a wrong signal to certain communities.
