Will Congress ‘lose’ Telengana?
December 9th, 2009
For people outside Andhra Pradesh it may not appear so but situation in that state is worsening by the day. The polarisation of the state is complete. Within the state you are either for Telengana or against it. There is no middle path left for anyone. Not anymore. The same goes for Congress too. They may have successfully taken the middle path for the last so many years but not anymore. They are trying to buy time by reaching out to KCR to end his fast but they cannot delay taking a decision on the issue of separate state of Telengana. Unfortunately, they’ve delayed taking a decision for so long that they stand to lose even if they now grant statehood to Telengana, for a variety of reasons.
Firstly, the stage at which we are today wherein we are seeing widespread protests within Andhra, people in Telengana region are dead against Congress because it was Congress which had initially promised the statehood and backed out later on because of which KCR walked out of UPA. This is not going to change anytime soon even if Congress gives in to this demand. The credit will go to KCR and KCR only. Congress may try and corner some brownie points but fact remains that it is KCR who shall get the credit. Just to point out that in case there is anymore violence and innocent lives are lost in the state Congress will get further alleviated from these people. Mind you, KCR knows that if he ends his fast and Telengana state is not formed he will lose all his credibility. Therefore it will be naive on anyone’s part to expect him to budge from this demand. And that leaves Congress in a very precarious and dangerous situation.
Secondly, if KCR does not end his fast soon and, God forbid, if he dies, let us be very clear about the fact that there will be violence and bloodshed in the state and Congress will be held guilty for being responsible for not just KCR’s death but all the other innocents as well, who may die in this violence. And then there will be no hope in hell for the party to come to power in both the states, whether divided or otherwise. 
Thirdly, this indecision has a lot to with who is in power in Andhra at the moment, and thats Congress. For them it’s like gifting a part of their real estate to KCR and his TRS. As you would appreciate it’s difficult. Who likes to give away more than one third of their ‘property’? Not many I’d say. And that too for ever? Well, we can understand how difficult it is for Congress. Also, if BJP is supporting this demand it is more because of the fact that they’ve never been in power in this state and may well never be than for the real issues behind this demand.
Fourthly, carving out this state itself may not be that big an issue as that of Hyderabad which is well within the Telangana region and is currently the capital of Andhra Pradesh. There is no way that you can make the state of Telengana with Hyderabad continuing to be a part of ‘new’ Andhra Pradesh. There may be a few other options also available for this purpose but there are pros and cons with each. For one, Hyderabad may continue to a capital of both Telengana and ‘new’ Andhra like Chandigarh is for Haryana and Punjab. Unfortunately, like I said, it is well within Telengana region and therefore may not be contiguous to ‘new’ Andhra. Will this be acceptable to Congress? Quite unlikely. Things may change if KCR agrees to part with Mahbubnagar or Nallagonda which though happen to be integral to the region(check the picture above). The second option is to make the city a Union Territory and make two different capitals for the two states. May be Warangal for Telengana and Vizag for ‘new’ Andhra. Mind you, this is a very strong feeling amongst the one crore people of Hyderabad who want to go their separate way. Whether this acceptable to TRS and Congress is pretty difficult to say for now. But if it comes to having a state without Hyderabad or not having Telengana at all TRS may agree to it.
Whatever be the case this demand for Telengana has a few more dimensions attached to it which we need to take into consideration. The first is that this is exactly what happens when development is not homogeneous within a state. Both YSR and Chandrababu Naidu followed exclusive and not inclusive brand of development. They concentrated more on on Rayalseema and coastal areas of the state and neglected Telengana because of which people of this region have got alienated and frustrated, especially with Congress, as is obvious from these protests. The demand may have been decades old but if the region had benefited from Andhra’s progress things would have been absolutely different today.
Also, there is a castiest dimension to this issue because the majority of the populace in this area is from backward classes. On the face of it it seems that everyone in the region wants a separate state but the fact is that this demand has gained such a momentum only because the backward and poor classes have supported it. If this state comes into existence it will basically comprise of poor and backward classes. Actually, this may prove to be an experiment if dividing a state on developmental issues or class composition is beneficial or detrimental to the country.
Lastly, we must not forget that once this state comes into being there are others like Ajit Singh who is demanding Harit Pradesh out of Western UP, who will now use this oppurtunity to further their demand. Unfortunatley, this one is basically a religion based demand, as renowned columnist MJ Akbar has pointed out and which I wrote about in my post Muslim state within India?. Can we afford to do something like that too? I don’t think so. And well, that leaves Congress on a very sticky wicket from now on, for sure.
Related Post
Muslim state within India?
Haryana does not need development
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December 9th, 2009 at 5:05 pm
Hyderabad has to be a separate union territory. This city is different and is in no way related to this movement. Let Andhra Pradesh be divided. No problem with that but don't give this city a raw deal.
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December 10th, 2009 at 3:04 am
Those who migrated to Hyderabad from other parts of India and Andhra may want Hyderabad to be a separate UT but Telangana will not agree to this. There is no use of getting Telangana if Hyderabad is not part of it. They have already made it very clear.
And it is unfair to separate Hyderabad from Telangana because Telangana including Hyderabad was not even part of India when AP was formed. Kurnool was the capital of AP at that time. Even the state reorganisation committee said at time that Telangana should not be joined with AP, but the central govt went ahead.
The central govt should have handled it gracefully by honoring its election promise, but when has Congress handled anything gracefully?
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December 10th, 2009 at 10:07 am
Check the news shaan. They are talking of making it a UT.
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December 10th, 2009 at 11:15 am
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December 10th, 2009 at 5:22 pm
MLAs r quitting on this isu. statehud may not happen. i want andhra 2 b 1.
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December 10th, 2009 at 7:05 pm
IMAO best thing is to declare all states in india as countries and call india USI-united states if india... am saying this cos it did be more efficient to manage given the diversity and population of our sub continent... wot say sush, my esteemed future politician ;-) ?
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December 10th, 2009 at 7:22 pm
There are 2 sides. The Telangana people have been fighting for this for the last 50 years and they are naturally happy now. The Andhra people who generally thought this would never happen suddenly face the situation where they have to sacrifice all the recent development they have brought to Hyderabad. If Hyderabad is to become UT, both Telangana and the rest of AP will lose. So they will not accept it. For all their posturing, it may not be possible for the Congress MLAs to do anything now at the last stage even if they resign en masse. The govt has already committed to Telengana even in the parliament.
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December 10th, 2009 at 8:11 pm
@shaan, possibly Congress is in a minority now in Andhra. What to talk of the statehood of Telengana even their CM K Rossaih may lose the chair of CM, of 'new' Andhra that is. And yes, about Congress, like I said they are on a very sticky wicket indeed.
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December 10th, 2009 at 8:47 pm
thats wot i meant-United States of India and i am damn serious about it!!!
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December 11th, 2009 at 9:52 am
voila-------- you were right about demand for other states which is now picking up. it was natuaral.
@swami, shame on you to say that let us divide our country into small pieces.
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Comments on : voila-------- you were right a....
Comment By : swami www ji
December 11, 2009
Macd-maybe i deny u a denail....
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December 11th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
Its a shame that this is happening. I have written a post on the issue on my blog. The link to that is:
http://tavishviews.blogspot.com/2009/12/seperate-telangana-is-it-right-solution.html
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December 11th, 2009 at 6:37 pm
@Hyderabadi
Hyderabad to be capital of Telangana
http://www.ptinews.com/news/418901_Hyderabad-will-be-Telangana-s-capital--Pillai
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December 11th, 2009 at 9:43 pm
MacD i never thought these politicians would think about splitting the country in such an insensible manner....
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December 12th, 2009 at 12:47 am
@swami,
This time around it is not the mistake of the politicians. Telangana became a people's movement. That is the reason even KCR was not able to withdraw his fast before getting any assurance from the center though his health was failing fast. See the following link, it says the students would have lynched KCR if he had withdrawn the fast without getting Telangana.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Will-Chandrasekhara-Rao-become-another-Raju-guide/articleshow/5305368.cms
It is not proper to blame politicians for everything in a democracy. In India it has become fashionable for the educated middle class to blame the politicians for everything without thinking of their own responsibility. For all the display of patriotism in Mumbai after terrorist attacks, the voting was still 43%. What a shame. Still when Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said that these people wear makeup and lipstick and go for protests, there was a huge uproar against it. He was politically incorrect but what he said is the fact.
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December 12th, 2009 at 6:12 am
oh okies... i'm sorry shaan...
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Comments on : oh okies... i'm sorry shaan.......
Comment By : swami www ji
December 12, 2009
shaan i was talking about mayavati telling UP is big n needs to be split....not about telengana!
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December 12th, 2009 at 8:41 am
@swami www ji, u first said that India shud be split now u say that politicians r splitting the country insensibly. confusing.
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December 12th, 2009 at 8:54 am
yea MacD still i think indian management(of states) should be split efficiently... maybe i was wrong in tellin india shud be split, bluntly...sowie budd
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December 14th, 2009 at 11:47 am
Hi,this is my first visit to your blog site.
Very interesting.Sure will come back to read all the previous posts
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December 30th, 2009 at 8:06 pm
Hyderabad will not be included
in telagana, It is sure.
First of all Telagana itself is
not going to happen
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