“I had tried to seek a middle path, asking for an autonomous council under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution but it had been delayed for two years,” Ghisingh said in Siliguri on Thursday.

The GNLF will revert to the statehood demand, he told mediapersons at a guesthouse in the town.

Asked whom should the Centre and the state governments talk to, since the issue of separate Gorkhaland has been raised by the Darjeeling Gorkha Janamukti Morcha also, Ghisingh said: “They should talk to all quarters who have raised this demand.”

Janamukti Morcha leaders, meanwhile, met Congress president Sonia Gandhi, BJP leaders L K Advani and Rajnath Singh in New Delhi on Thursday and submitted memoranda.

The Morcha is demanding statehood for Darjeeling, comprising the three existing hill sub-divisions, parts of Siliguri and Terai, and a part of the Dooars region inhabited by Nepalis.

Talking to The Indian Express, Roshan Giri, a spokesman for the Morcha, said: “The leaders gave a patient hearing to us. We are hopeful that our sentiments would be honoured.”