SPEAKING
FREELY Telangana issue sparks more
turmoil By Francesco Brunello
Zanitti
Speaking Freely is an Asia
Times Online feature that allows guest writers to
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Telangana has come
back to haunt Hyderabad, the capital of the Indian
state of Andhra Pradesh. The decades-long demand
for separation and autonomy of the 10 districts of
Telangana has become the focus of attention in the
city and region thanks to an impressive march on
September 30, called Sagara Haram.
Tensions in Hyderabad are high, especially
in the historic center of the pro-Telangana
movement, the Arts College of Osmania University.
The re-emergence of protests has come in a
particularly difficult
period for the city, especially in terms of
security.
The march was organized by the
Telangana Joint Action Committee (TJAC), a
non-partisan union spanning different categories
of civil society. TJAC, is led by political
science professor at Osmania University, M
Kodandaram, has as its main objective not only a
bid to garner awareness among local and central
authorities, but also a quickly and definite
solution to the Telangana issue.
The
problem of Telangana is one of the most difficult
in the Indian history, having its roots in
colonial period and different administrations of
Andhra Pradesh's regions during the British rule
over India. Today, the focus is on the lack of
water resources in rural areas and absence of job
prospects for young people. The population of the
10 districts suffers a chronic shortages of water
during persistent summers of drought. According to
supporters of separation, the Andhra region has
been constantly favored by state government. In
past years, numerous cases of suicides among young
students and farmers have been recorded across the
region.
The Telangana march was held
between the Hindu festival linked to Lord Ganesh,
which was planned on September 29 and 30 with the
presence of millions of devotees in procession
through the streets of the city, and the 19-day
global biodiversity event, the 11th Conference of
Parties (COP) to Convention on Biological
Diversity (CBD), started in Hyderabad on October
1. (Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited the
international convention on October 16.)
The local government feared protests would
give the city a bad international name and tried
to prevent the march right up to the last moment.
The September 30 march was characterized
by a series of violent incidents - and the slogan
Jai Ganesh - Jai Telangana (victory to
Telangana), which was heard repeatedly on
Hyderabad's streets.
Supporters of
Telangana statehood fought pitched battles with
the police in several areas of the city. Violence
was evident especially in the Osmania campus,
where student organizations tried to break the
police checkpoints to reach the rest of the
demonstrators in Hyderabad. Police and the TJAC
blamed each other.
The police accused
certain left-wing extremist groups being involved
in the violence; the authorities blamed also
protesters because they infringed the conditions.
All relevant details on routes were provided but
according to police, supporters of Telangana did
not follow them. However, the Civil Liberties
Monitoring Committee condemned the attack on
Telangana activists and deplored the free hand
given to the police by state authorities.
During colonial times, Telangana was ruled
by a Muslim sovereign, the Nizam of Hyderabad, who
reigned over the Hyderabad state, an autonomous
region but directly linked to Great Britain; the
remaining areas of current Andhra Pradesh (Coastal
Andhra and Rayalaseema) were instead directly
administrated by the British Raj under what was
called as Madras Presidency. The arrangement
resulted in a different levels of economic and
social development between the two areas.
The political movement for the separation
of Telangana emerged in the late 1960s and then
found new life in the last decade after the birth
of three new states in the Indian Federation:
Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand. However,
the Telangana issue is essentially an economic
problem, not linguistic, ethnic or religious.
The response of political parties is
ambivalent. Several political parties were present
at the event of September 30 , such as Telangana
Rashtra Samithi (TRS), Bharatiya Janata Party
(BJP) and Communist Party of India (CPI); but the
reality is that the parties are divided on the
Telangana issue, unlike the civil society, which
is gathered around bodies such as TJAC. TRS, led
by K Chandrashekar Rao, is the only party created
specifically on a an agenda for the birth of
Telangana as a separate state.
The
Congress party of Andhra Pradesh is divided on the
issue. Members who support the creation of
Telangana avoided the march, fearing potentials
attacks, as happened last year during Million
March for Telangana. Finance Minister P
Chidambaram, said in 2009 when he was defense
minister that within few months the process for
the creation of a separate state in Andhra Pradesh
would been started; a statement that was not
followed in practice in subsequent years but still
present in the memory of Telangana people.
The Congress party's historical enemy in
the region, the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) is also
divided - for understandable reasons because the
party was founded for the unity of all people
speaking Telugu. This Dravidian language is spoken
throughout Andhra Pradesh.
A few days
before the march, TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu has
sent a letter to the prime minister, urging a
quick resolution This, however, led to the
predictable protests from some in the the party
coming from Rayalaseema and Coastal Andhra, with
the threat of resignations. The BJP instead
claimed that it will include in its program of
government the immediate creation of Telangana for
2014.
It's obvious that many political
parties support the creation of Telangana that
will be surely a workhorse for the next elections,
both in Andhra Pradesh and national level in 2014.
TDP, BJP, CPI and Congress are almost forced to
back the move for electoral reasons.
The
main point however is another. The failure for the
birth of Telangana is not only linked to the
failure of the local political leadership, which
is constantly divided, but it is also caused by
strong economic interests, especially those of
Andhra businesses. The latter are fearful of
losing their profits in the case of birth of a new
state.
The heart of the matter is the
future of Hyderabad, the economic center of the
region. A Telangana without its historical capital
is unthinkable, but economic interests are too
strong and in these terms a real bifurcation of
Andhra Pradesh is at the same time unlikely.
The two main objections that many
politicians, especially of Congress and TDP, pose
to the creation of Telangana is Hyderabad and
investments in the capital. Regarding Hyderabad,
politicians linked to the commercial interests are
afraid of losing the city, even if they do not
explicitly say so. They believe they have invested
heavily in its development; for example the ten
best hospitals in Hyderabad are in the hands of
personalities related to Andhra and12 of the 50
leading companies across India are owned by
entrepreneurs of the state. The companies have
taken many benefits from the economic boom of
Hyderabad and surrounding suburbs, and it is
precisely because of these interests that they are
not ready to let go the city.
Another
important point to consider is the actual
effectiveness of a new state in solving problems
relating to disadvantaged groups such as the
water-starved farmers in rural areas.
Will
a separate state solve the region's water
problems? Many supporters of Telangana argue in
favor of management of their own resources without
having to convey water towards the coastal areas
of Andhra. Why is a united Andhra Pradesh not able
to solve these problems?
The region would
require a strengthening of infrastructure and an
equal redistribution of water resources and jobs
between different areas because it is an
historical fact that the people of Telangana were
disadvantaged by the creation of Andhra Pradesh in
1956.
In this sense, permanent political,
social and economic inequalities between regions
for historical reasons play a fundamental role.
The lower educational, economic and social
conditions in Telangana allowed privileged access
in public, administrative and governmental sectors
to personalities linked to Andhra who naturally
favored their region. In this sense, however, this
is another failure of political leadership coming
from Telangana.
The seeking of a Telangana
state is absolutely legitimate and democratic,
according to the Article 3 of Constitution of
India, which grants the creation of new state only
through a decision by the central government. The
problem is that Article 3 is too vague. In this
sense, a clear answer is needed from New Delhi
because it is not understandable why cases like
Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand were
granted in a very short time and Telangana is
still waiting.
It is necessary to adopt
clearer and uniform criteria for all areas of the
Federation, but obviously there are different
political and economic conditions of each area as
economic interests in Andhra Pradesh clearly
demonstrate. Otherwise with a deadlock, tensions
between different components of Indian society
will increase as confirmed by the events of recent
weeks in Hyderabad.
In addition, a failure
to clarify the principle of creation of new state
and actual birth of Telangana could lead similar
demands in other parts of India, especially in
poor areas which wish to separate from rich and
prosperous regions. The greatest danger is the
increase of populist and identity politics based
on religious, economic, ethnic, social and caste
criteria. This has already happened in other areas
of the country.
In recent years Congress
has not paid great attention to the issue, even
though the popular movement is very strong. It is
obvious that a clear decision can upset one side
or the other of the region, yet a response is
necessary to avoid paralysis of the region and in
Hyderabad. A first step could be a search for a
real consensus on the issue between the different
political parties in order to reach a strong and
unambiguous position over Telangana and its
problems.
Francesco Brunello
Zanitti is the Research Associate and Southern
Asia Research Program's Director of IsAG
(Institute for Advanced Studies in Geopolitics and
Auxiliary Sciences.
Speaking Freely
is an Asia Times Online feature that allows guest
writers to have their say.Please
click hereif you are interested in
contributing. Articles submitted for this section
allow our readers to express their opinions and do
not necessarily meet the same editorial standards
of Asia Times Online's regular contributors.
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