• Velichala Jagapathi Rao, a former Member of Legislative Council (MLC) from the Congress party in Karimnagar, played a significant role in the 1969 movement for a separate Telangana.
• In 1989, he organized a series of awareness camps over three days in Karimnagar to educate the public about the injustices faced by the Telangana region.
• Jagapathi Rao was actively involved in the “Jala Sadhana Samithi” movement, initiated by Dushcharla Satyanarayana in Nalgonda, aiming to address water issues in the region.
• He participated in a march (Pada Yatra) from Nalgonda to the Srisailam project as part of the “Jala Sadhana Samithi” movement, highlighting regional water resource concerns.
• Rao also convened a meeting at the Sri Ram Sagar project to discuss and publicize the specific injustices experienced by the people of Telangana in relation to this major irrigation project.
• In 1991-92, he authored and published a detailed report on the inequities Telangana faced in the irrigation and electricity sectors.
• The findings of this report deeply resonated with the local population, intensifying feelings of sadness and anger and galvanizing them towards protest against these injustices.

Formation and Activities of the Telangana Legislative Forum:

• During 1991-92, Velichala Jagapathi Rao, serving as the convenor, established the “Telangana Legislative Forum.” The forum united approximately 100 MLAs from various political parties within the Telangana region, electing Jana Reddy as its chairman.
• The members of the forum traveled to Delhi to meet with then-President and Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao to advocate for the creation of a separate Telangana state.
• Despite being from the Telangana region, P.V. Narasimha Rao supported a united Andhra Pradesh during his tenure as Prime Minister from 1991 to 1996, and did not take steps toward establishing a separate Telangana state.
• The forum also submitted a memorandum to the then Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, Nedurumalli Janardhan Reddy, which led to discussions on the Telangana issue during the State Assembly proceedings in September. Chief Minister Janardhan Reddy acknowledged the issues and promised to address the injustices faced by the Telangana region.
• However, Janardhan Reddy was subsequently replaced by Kotla Vijaya Bhaskar Reddy as Chief Minister by the Congress party.
• Additionally, alongside Jagapathi Rao, N. Prabhakar, a former Chief Engineer of irrigation, penned essays to raise awareness about the region’s irrigation projects and the need for dedicated efforts to resolve these longstanding issues