Claiming it was anguished by the Centres affidavit in the Supreme Court negating Maharashtra's claim over Belgaum and 865 villages in Karnataka,the Ashok Chavan-led Congress-NCP government in Maharashtra demanded on Tuesday that the disputed areas be declared as Union Territories till the apex court delivered its verdict. Chief Minister Ashok Chavan,scheduled to lead an all-party delegation from Maharashtra to meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday,demanded that the disputed areas be placed under the Centres control and status quo be maintained on the issue. Speaking in the Assembly on Tuesday,Chavan said they would ask the Centre to maintain a status quo in the Maharashtrian- dominated areas of Karnataka. Charging the Karnataka government with suppressing the Maharashtrians in the areas,Chavan said,These attempts (of suppressing the agitation),which were initially mild,have picked up in the last couple of years. He added that a look at the conditions indicated it was being done to crush the agitation. The Chief Minister said Maharashtra would not take this lying down and added that the human rights commission needed to consider the issue seriously. In the Legislative Council,Chavan reasserted his demand of putting the disputed areas under Centres rule. He urged the opposition parties to support the government in case of an out-of-court settlement with the Karnataka government over the issue. Commenting on the Centres affidavit which said the State Reorganisation Committee had observed a balanced approach,not an arbitrary one,and that it was not correct to say that certain areas were wrongly merged in Karnataka,Chavan said,Our agitation will continue till we get all the 865 villages. Reacting to the Centres stand that language was not the sole criterion but one of the four criterias,Chavan said: Language is not the sole criterion,but an important one. He pointed out that the principles of reorganisation of states were done on four criterias,village as a unit,geographical continguity,linguistic and cultural homogeneity and wishes of people. He said that Maharashtras demand was just,but the Karnataka governments hostile attitude towards pro-Marathi agitators,who were lathicharged,was undemocratic. Referring to the law and order issue,the proposed renaming of Belgaum as Belagavi and the Karnataka Assemblys session recently held in Belgaum that was granted the status of Karnatakas second capital,Chavan said it was like adding salt to Maharashtras wounds. The Assembly passed a resolution expressing its outrage and asking the Centre to reconsider its stand on the issue. Meanwhile,legislators from all the parties condemned Karnataka government for persecuting Marathi-speaking people in the border areas. The Maharashtra Navnirman Sena went a step further to suggest that Maharashtra Legislative Council should have a seat reserved for a representative from the disputed areas,while Assembly speaker Dilip Walse-Patil asked the government to offer sops in education and employment to people of the disputed areas on par with that offered to people living in Jammu and Kashmir. BJP supports state stand,Uddhav for CRPF in disputed areas The BJP has supported Maharashtra's demand to declare the disputed areas along the state's border with Karnataka as UTs. "If the Centre is ready for Central rule (in the Maharashtrian dominated areas of Karnataka),then we are also ready," said BJP Maharashtra president and MLA Sudhir Mungantiwar. Meanwhile,Shiv Sena executive president Uddhav Thackeray demanded deployment of the CRPF in the disputed border areas.
