Telengana and its Repercussions
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By Mrs Rangamani M Swamy
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India had never been one country. In olden days, India consisted of innumerable small and big kingdoms, ruled by kings and sub-kings (Samantha Rajas). They used to fight against each other and one another. Later, Mohammedans from Afghanistan and other countries invaded India and occupied large part of the country. Even then, various kingdoms existed, ruled by sub-kings (Samantha Rajas). At the time of the decline of Mohammedan rule, India had many kingdoms ruled by Rajas and Nawabs. The British moved into India for business and slowly occupied India. It was only under the British rule that India has become one country, with various states and kingdoms under the central control at Delhi.

Under British rule, the country was divided into provinces like United Provinces, Central Provinces, Bombay Province, Bengal Province and Madras Province etc., which were under direct control of Viceroy at Delhi through Governors for various provinces. There were also separate kingdoms like Jammu and Kashmir, Mysore, Travancore, Cochin, Nizams Dominions, Junaghad and many others with their own kings, but under the control of the Central Government through their Resident Representatives.

In 1947, the British decided to leave India to Indians and go back. While doing so, they partitioned India into two countries, India and Pakistan (East Pakistan and West Pakistan). With the advent of Independence to India in 1947, British handed over power to Indians, leaving the choice to various kingdoms in India to join the main stream or to be independent themselves. Most of the states joined the mainstream; but a few major kingdoms like Nizams Dominions, Junaghad, and Travancore showed resistance. Sardar Vallabhai Patel, the Iron Man of India, who was the Defense Minister of India at that time, brought them round by taking police action in Nizams and other stern actions in Travancore and Junaghad and others. Finally, all the kingdoms are abolished and India has become one centrally administered country.

A few years after independence, dissentions started and movements for linguistic states cropped up. The most prominent of them was the movement for a separate Telugu speaking state (Andhra State), seceding from the Madras Province, which consisted of Telugu speaking, Tamil speaking, Malayalam speaking and Kannada speaking areas. The Central Government, under the leadership of Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru was against the splitting of the states. The Andhra movement, with people from coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema regions, gained ground and finally, one leader Mr. Potti Sreeramulu, undertook a fast unto death at Madras in 1953, for attaining the Andhra state. The Government of India did not react in time and meanwhile the leader Mr. Potti Sriramulu died. This led to wide spread and severe disturbances in the state and Prime Minister, Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru had to agree and announce the formation of a separate Andhra state, consisting of coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema districts. Thus, the Andhra State, with Kurnool as Capital, and High Court at Guntur, was formed in August 1953.
Formation of Andhra state went on very smoothly. There was no rancor between the Andhra state and the bifurcated Madras state. The transition was very smooth. In fact, as the new state has no personnel at higher levels with experience, some of the senior officers of the Madras state were deputed to Andhra state for some time and they did a great job. Andhra state slowly was stabilizing and becoming strong. At this time, state reorganization committee of India, gave a report on the formation of linguistic states and it was implemented by Government of India in 1956. As a result of this, all the Telugu speaking areas in the Nizams territory were merged with Andhra state and combined area was called Andhra Pradesh. The Marata speaking area was merged with Maharashtra state and the Kannada speaking area was merged with Karnataka state. The Telugu speaking people of Nizams Dominions (Telengana) welcomed this, as Vishalandhra was the slogan of the political parties at that time.

Things went on well and smoothly with Andhra Pradesh for more than a decade. But in the year 1969, an agitation, called Telengana agitation, was started by the people of Telengana for a separate state. It was mainly backed by the services, which felt that they were not getting a good deal in their appointments and promotions. This agitation did not succeed; but the ill feelings between Telengana and Andhra mounted, which resulted in a major agitation, called Andhra agitation by the people in Coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema in the year 1973. In that agitation, many lives were lost and properties damaged. The Government of India came into the picture and suggested a compromise deal, which was accepted by all. Things started moving normally. For nearly three decades it was smooth sailing and life in Andhra Pradesh went off very well. Any differences are between politicians and political parties and not between people. The leaders of political parties, who headed the Government, concentrated on the development of the state overall both in Andhra area and Telengana area. Along with the development of Industries, Information technology, infrastructure and roads, the Government concentrated on agriculture and Irrigation, which were the backbone of Andhra Pradesh, as Andhra Pradesh is mainly an agricultural state and more than 60% of the population depended on agriculture. With the starting and execution of many major, medium and minor irrigation projects, in the two areas, Telengana and Andhra, the farmers were happy. With the implementation of Health projects for common man like “Arogya Sree” and “108”, the common man is getting the best of medical care with no cost. The execution of all these beneficial schemes changed the mindset of the people.

Meanwhile, some politicians started playing the Telengana card again amongst the people, saying that injustice is being done to the Telengana area. They started a separate party called ‘Telengana Rastra Semite” and tried to take the people along with them for the formation of a separate Telengana state. The Government of India did not show any interest in this. Meanwhile, the general elections 2009 have come in. The Telengana Rastra Samiti was very active and contested for major seats for the Assembly. Some other parties like Telugu Desam, Praja Rajyam party and others also thought that there was a wave towards the formation of Telengana among the people and formed alliance with the Telengana Rashtra Samiti. The congress was the only party that did not share this view. It contested in all the seats in the Telengana area and the state, based on the performance of their congress government in the last five year term. The elections were fought on the above basis and finally when election results were announced, it was found that the Telengana Rastra Samiti, which stood for Telengana drew a blank, winning only 10 seats out of 300 in the assembly and only 2 seats in the Parliament out of about 600 seats. The Telengana people have not voted for the Telengana state. They voted for the performance of the government and the development of the Telengana area. This has sent shock waves among the leaders and cadres of Telengana Rastra samiti and its allied parties. Congress with a resounding majority had formed the government in Andhra Pradesh in 2009.

Things were going good for a few months, when the congress Chief Minister, Mr. Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, a strong and shrewd politician, died in a helicopter crash. This political vacuum led to the springing up of Telengana issue again by the Telengana Rashtra Samiti. Mr. K. Chandrasekhara Rao, the President of the Telengana Rashtra Samiti, went on an indefinite hunger strike for the achievement of Telengana state. This led to lot of disturbances in the Telengana area, especially by the students. As the hunger strike reached the 11th day, things had become worse. At this point of time, some thing unexpected had happened. The legislators and Members of Parliament of Telengana area suddenly supported the Telengana Rashtra Samiti, for separate Telengana state, irrespective of their party affiliations, like Congress, Telugu Desam, Prajarajyam and others. This aggravated the situation. The deterioration of health of Mr. T. Chandra.sekhara Rao added fuel to the fire. The Government of India was afraid that the state will get into chaos if anything untoward happens to the life of Mr. T. Chandrasekhara Rao. In view of this, the Government of India in a hurry gave a midnight announcement that the process of formation of separate Telengana will be started immediately with the Assembly of Andhra Pradesh, passing a suitable resolution in this regard. This midnight announcement calmed the agitators and Mr. T. Chandrasekhara Rao broke his fast and withdrew the agitation. Telengana has become calm. So far, so good.

But this hasty announcement of the Government of India has upset the people of Andhra and Rayalaseema areas. They felt that dividing the state at this stage and after more than five decades of formation and peaceful living and development, is not a good step. They wanted a combined Andhra state to be continued. In their turn, they started an agitation in Andhra and Rayalaseema areas, which had become very violent, with many people including a Member of Parliament and some legislators going on fast. All the MPs and MLAs of the Andhra area combined and sent their resignations to the Parliament and Assembly irrespective of their party affiliations. The agitation has gone to the level of students. There were violent demonstrations and loss of property and life. There were representations to the Congress President and Prime Minister from Andhra area. There was also opposition from the partners in the UPA government at the center for formation of Telengana state. With this, after due thought, the Government of India, went back on their earlier announcement and said that the issue needs deeper study and wider consultations among the various groups and this process will be initiated soon. With this announcement, the agitations in Andhra area stopped.

But at the same time, the agitations in Telengana reverberated. Agitations in Telengana area by students and others started again with Bandhs and violent activities. Now it is the turn of the Legislators and MPs of Telengana area to resign. Meanwhile a split has occurred, with the students of Osmania University manhandling the MLAs of Telugu Desam party, reportedly at the instance of Telengana Rastra Samiti. With this, Telugu Desam party dissociated itself and said they will strive for Telengana on their own. The Congress party also dissociated itself and said they will strive for Telengana on their own. The latest news is that, keeping its promise of setting up a high-level committee to hold consultations for the formation of Telangana state, the Centre has called for a meeting of representatives of all the political parties involved in the issue on 05 January 2010. It is difficult to say how things will move in the coming weeks. We have to wait and see.

This secession tendency is also growing very much now in other states of the country. Telengana seems to have opened a Pandora’s Box with more political leaders and regions now set to revive their demand for separate statehoods. The following are the demands in various states for formation of new states:

1. Harit Pradesh to be carved out of western Uttar Pradesh.
2. Gorkha land to be carved from West Bengal
3. Vidarbha to be carved from Maharashtra
4. Bundelkhand to be carved from Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh
5. Bhojpur state to be carved from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar
6. Mithilanchal to be carved from Bihar
7. Saurastra to be carved from Gujarat
8. Greater Cooch Behar state to be carved from West Bengal and Assam
9. Coorg to be carved from Karnataka.
10. Maru Pradesh to be carved from Rajasthan

In addition to this, there is a talk that there are suggestions that Tamil Nadu state may be divided into Southern Tamil Nadu and Northern Tamil Nadu. There is also a talk that if Telengana is to be formed, the Andhra area is to be trifurcated into: 1).Greater Rayalaseema 2) South Coastal Andhra and 3) North Coastal Andhra. Thus we find that there is no end to these fissiparous tendencies.

If things continue to go this way, the day may not be far off, for the Marathwada region and Kannadiga region of old Nizams dominions, which were merged with Maharastra state and Karnataka state in 1956, to raise their demand to form separate states for themselves, seceding from Maharashtra and Karnataka states..

During the Independence movement, Gandhi Ji taught us that we are Indians first and Andhra, Tamil, Hindi, Maharashtra, Urdu etc. next. Thus, under the united banner of “Indian”, we got the independence. Also, under the united banner of “Indian”, we achieved a lot and took the country, India, forward. If these values are given up and we disperse ourselves on linguistic basis and also as sub-linguistic and regional groups, we don’t know where we are taking our country. As per the present estimates, India will be the 3rd economically forward country in the world by 2020, next to US and China. If we waste our precious time in these internal squabbles, we are definitely going to go down in the line nationally and internationally. God forbid and may better sense prevail in the politicians and leaders.
(Mrs M Rangamani M. L. Swamy is very knowledgeable and active member of the Chaubara. She is a wife of M L Swamy who is a former chief Engineer of Andhra Pradesh and was World Bank Consultant.)
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