Time for Telangana

Telangana is back in the headlines with a bang once again with MPs and legislators, belonging to the region, from virtually all political parties including the ruling Congress party, tendering their resignation in what seems to be a desperate bid to force the Centre to bring in a law for the creation of a separate state in the upcoming Monsoon session of Parliament. Several Ministers in the state Government too have put in their papers, rejecting the mediation by the party high command.

The en masse resignations were followed by a 48 hour bandh, call for which was given by the Telangana Joint Action Committee to put pressure on the Centre to concede statehood. Offices, educational institutions, shops and business establishments remained shut and several bus and train services were cancelled.

The emotive Telangana issue has been like a volcano erupting off and on. Unfortunately, all political parties have all along been maintaining inconsistency on the issue and kept changing their stance according to their electoral convenience.

There has also been an attempt to compare the demand for Telangana with similar demands for smaller states across the country and fears have been raised time and again that conceding to the demand would open a pandora’s box and the country could ill afford creation of so many smaller states.

While smaller states may be administratively more convenient and give greater say to the local populace in matters of governance, states such as Jharkhand, where independent MLAs like Madhu Kora became Chief Ministers and amassed wealth vastly disproportionate to their income, showed the inherent fragility of polity in the newly carved out utopias often touted as the ultimate panacea for misgovernance and maladministration in large states.

However, the demand for Telangana, comprising the Telugu speaking portions of the erstwhile princely state of Hyderabad, has been there right since the time of nation’s independence. Except for the Telugu language, there was and is very little in common between the peoples of Telangana and other regions of the state namely Rayalaseema and Coastal Andhra.

To begin with, Telangana was never under direct British rule, unlike the Coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema regions of Andhra Pradesh, which were part of British India’s Madras Presidency..
It may be recalled that the States Reorganization Commission (SRC) , appointed in 1953, to study the creation of states on linguistic basis, was not in favour of an immediate merger of Telangana region with Andhra state, despite their common language.

The Commission found that the people of Telangana had several concerns including a less-developed economy than Andhra, but with a larger revenue base, which people of Telangana feared might be diverted for use in Andhra.

In fact, the then Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru was initially skeptical of merging Telangana with Andhra State, fearing a "tint of expansionist imperialism" in it. He compared the merger to a matrimonial alliance having "provisions for divorce" if the partners in the alliance cannot get on well.

Finally, the new state of Andhra Pradesh came into being on November 1, 1956 with assurances to Telangana in terms of power-sharing as well as administrative domicile rules and distribution of expenses of various regions.

However, the honeymoon did not last long with the people of Telangana expressing dissatisfaction over the implementation of the agreements and guarantees., made at the time of the state’s merger.

According to proponents of a separate state, Telangana is not only the largest of the three regions of Andhra Pradesh state, covering 41.47% of its total area and inhabited by 40.54% of the state's population but also contributes about 76% of the state's revenues, excluding the contribution of the central government.

They also cite perceived injustices in the distribution of water, budget allocations, and jobs. They allege that Budget allocations to Telangana are generally less than 1/3 of the total Andhra Pradesh budget. There are also allegations that in most years, funds allocated to Telangana were never spent. According to the proponents of separate statehood, only 20% of the total Government employees, less than 10% of employees in the secretariat, and less than 5% of department heads in the Andhra Pradesh government are from Telangana.
Following widespread protests last year, the Centre had announced a five-member committee on Telangana headed by retired Justice B N Srikrishna to look into the issue.

But instead of coming out with a strong recommendation, the Committee, in its report, offered six options ranging from maintaining the status quo to creation of a separate state with the contentious Hyderabad as a Union Territory as also acceptance of the demand for carving out a separate state with Hyderabad as its capital in toto.

Continuing with its dilly dallying tactics, the Centre sat on the recommendations, resulting in the present crisis.

With United Andhra contributing the highest number of MPs to its kitty, the Centre is hesitant to take a decision on the issue. With the charismatic YSR no more around and his son Jaganmohan Reddy threatening to undermine the party’s base in Seema-Andhra, the party’s options are limited.

The Congress also does not want the TRS, BJP or other regional parties to take credit for creation of a separate state. Having realised that the creation of Telangana was inevitable and a matter of time in the wake of consensus on the issue among all parties and sharp division within its own rank and file, the resignation of Congress Ministers, MLAs and MPs is being seen by political observers as a last ditch stage managed attempt by the Congress party to hijack the movement and retain at least part of its fast dwindling strength south of Vindhyas.

With only 38 MLAs and a wafer thin majority in Kerala, a discredited ally in Tamil Nadu, a near wipe out in Karnataka in the wake of BJP’s continued winning spree in Assembly and civic polls and a fast eroding base in Andhra thanks to Jaganmohan Reddy and a weak state leadership, Congress, it seems, sees a last straw of hope in Telangana.

Thus, the Congress men’s sudden penchant for Telangana has apparently more to do with realpolitik than the sentiments and aspirations of the people of the region. Whatever be the political compulsions, it is high time the people of Telangana get to realise their long cherished dream with the people of Seemandhra being adequately compensated for the loss of Hyderabad and having no bitterness for their brethren.

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