Thursday, April 20 2006 15:59 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Adilabad(AP): After declaring support for the Telangana statehood cause, the BJP today (Apr 20, 2006) went a step further and invited Telangana Rashtra Samithi(TRS), a partner in the Congress-led UPA government, to join hands with the NDA for achieving its goal.

"Should the TRS quit the UPA, the BJP will gladly join hands with it for the fulfillment of statehood aspirations of the people of Telangana," Advani told reporters here on the 11th day of his Bharat Suraksha Yatra.

Accusing the Congress of betraying the people on the issue, he said its pre-poll ally TRS would be morally obliged to quit UPA if the policy of betrayal continued beyond the budget session of the Parliament.

Virtually setting a deadline for the UPA government to introduce a constitutional amendment bill to carve out a Telangana state, the Leader of Opposition said he wanted to know why the bill was being delayed.

Noting that the promise of a separate state was the basis of the Congress-TRS alliance in the 2004 elections, he said, "Though two years have passed, Congress leaders at the Centre and state are behaving as if they never made this promise".

He even cautioned that if TRS failed to quit UPA, it would be guilty of betrayal of its promise of Telangana state.

Advani's offer of friendship to TRS comes against the backdrop of growing friction between Congress and the Telangana party on the statehood issue.

"In order to expose the dishonesty and duplicity of Congress on Telangana issue, I had dared the UPA to bring forward a bill on creation of Telangana," he said.