Sonia or No Sonia: PRP-Cong to merge
posted on Aug 5, 2011 @ 12:51PM
Inspite of the Congress president Mrs. Sonia Gandhi, who had invited him, is away in the United States for an emergency medical treatment, the Praja Rajyam chief Mr K. Chiranjeevi is planning to go ahead with the programme to take Congress membership in New Delhi on 8 August as scheduled earlier.
Mrs Gandhi had invited Mr Chiranjeevi to New Delhi between August 7 and 10, to formalise the merger of the PR with the Congress. The PR leader had planned to call on her on August 8, but the unexpected development has unsettled the PR. "We don't want to postpone it further. We are planning to go ahead with the programme to take Congress membership in the presence of Congress Core Committee members. However, a final decision will be taken on Friday," Mr Chiranjeevi said. He added, "It's unfortunate that the Congress president is sick and unavailable. We wish her a speedy recovery."
Ever since the PRP-Congress merger has been announced, it is getting delay for one reason or the other. He decided to merge the PR with the Congress in February, and since then, first the Telangana agitation and then Mrs Gandhi’s busy schedule and the party’s preoccupation with various issues at the Centre have conspired to delay the formal merger. The frustration of Mr. Chiranjeevi is understandable and it would also be prudent of him not to postpone it further, paving way for dissent among the party's cadre. While Mr Chiranjeevi will take membership in New Delhi, other party MLAs will do the same in Hyderabad.