T S Sudhir
Hyderabad, November 1, 2013 | UPDATED 16:13 IST
'Happy Birthday Andhra Pradesh' has a sad tinge to it today. For this
November 1 could well be the last Andhra Pradesh Formation Day that the
state is celebrating in its present form. If the Congress has its way,
by December, the state would be cut into two to create a new state of
Telangana with ten districts while the remaining 13 districts would
continue to call themselves Andhra Pradesh.
In 1956, Andhra Pradesh was the first state to be formed on linguistic basis. In 2013, that will fade into history.
By
all accounts it has been a messy divorce, with court proceedings (read
appeals in the Delhi Durbar by people from Andhra Pradesh) virulent,
emotional and ugly. That is because people from the coastal Andhra and
Rayalaseema regions think they have been given a raw deal. They believe
both in the short term and long term, the new Andhra Pradesh or
Seemandhra is going to be unviable. A flop state, condemned to doom,
from day one.
"Telugu speaking people will lose both politically
and economically in a big way. But then if that is a choice that the
Telugu speaking people have made consciously, they you cannot complain
about it,'' rues Jayaprakash Narayan, President of the Loksatta Party.
Narayan who is an MLA from Hyderabad city, is in favour of Telangana but
objects to the manner in which the state is being bifurcated.
Interestingly,
that it has been a case of 'winner takes all' is a sentiment shared
even by Telangana politicians in private. They gloat that they have
successfully managed to convince the powers-that-be in Delhi that the
"historical mistakes of the past" should be corrected by being
overgenerous to Telangana.
Andhra Pradesh sends 42 MPs to the Lok
Sabha, the highest in south India. Since 1996, this contingent has
played a central role in governments at the Centre, be it the Telugu
Desam in 1996, 1998 and 1999 or the Congress in 2004 and 2009. Now
Telangana state with 17 MPs and Seemandhra state with 25 MPs, will find
their political clout considerably reduced.
"Size matters,"
points out D A Somayajulu, former Economic Affairs Advisor to Andhra
Pradesh government and now a leader with the YSR Congress. "Now we are
going to lose this size. So no one will take you seriously. Does anyone
take Mizoram seriously the way they take a big state like Andhra
Pradesh. They wont.''
But reduced political clout is not the only
reason why many feel that it is a lose-lose situation for both states.
People of coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema are ruing that since Hyderabad
will longer be their state capital, it will take away the magnetic power
the state had to attract investors.
"Any division will have its
advantages and disadvantages. For the people of Seemandhra, losing a
capital city like Hyderabad, a city that has been developed over decades
is a loss. They cannot replicate even if they are given 2 or 3 lakh
crores. That kind of money can create infrastructure but it cannot
create an economy,'' says K Nageshwar, political analyst.
Somayajulu
argues that the administrators of Andhra Pradesh erred by putting all
the goodies in the Hyderabad basket as a result of which there is a
world of difference between the the state capital and other cities in
the state.
"In 2012-13, Andhra Pradesh had a software turnover of 55000 crores out of which
Rs.54800
crores was from Hyderabad. Which means 99.9% is from Hyderabad. This
means the engine of economic growth is in Hyderabad while the rest of
Andhra Pradesh will have only compartments with no engine. That too at a
time when agriculture constitutes just 15-16 per cent of GDP. So you
cannot have 84 per cent on one side and 16 per cent on the other. Not
the best way to divide a state," he says.
According to the Andhra
Pradesh finance ministry, Hyderabad accounts for 70 per cent of Andhra
Pradesh's tax revenues. In 2012-13, of the state's revenues of 69146
crore rupees,
Rs.48400 crore came from Hyderabad and its neighbouring Ranga Reddy district. The revenue from rest of Telangana was
Rs.6206 crore, coastal Andhra
Rs.10729 crore and Rayalaseema
Rs.3809 crores.
However
the Justice Srikrishna committee which studied the situation in Andhra
Pradesh, believed that Hyderabad as the bone of contention is over
hyped. In its 505 page report submitted in January 2011, it said this
about economic viability : "Telangana as a new state can sustain itself
both with and without Hyderabad. The other combination of regions -
coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema - together can also sustain themselves as
a state; in fact they can sustain themselves separately.''
The
committee's report pointed out that the Telangana region (excluding
Hyderabad) ranks 15th in the list of 28 states in terms of absolute GDP.
Including Hyderabad, its rank moves up to 13th place. Interestingly,
coastal Andhra ranks 13th too in terms of GDP. The laggard is
Rayalaseema, whose per capita income is below the all-India average.
Former
director of Centre for Public Policy and a votary of Telangana, Dr
Gautam Pingle therefore believes that this fear of Seemandhra being a
Bimaru state is just not true. "If they are bimaru, we are also bimaru.
We are in fact worse off. They have capital, entrepreneurship. For last
150 years, they had 2 million acres under both the deltas, thanks to the
Brits,'' says Dr Pingle.
However, that has not prevented the
battle for a united Andhra Pradesh from becoming a battle to retain
control over Hyderabad, some way or the other. Votaries of status quo
argue that it is because they are also interested in Hyderabad's
prosperity. Being made the capital of a Telangana state, they argue, is
killing Brand Hyderabad.
"If it were not to be the capital of a
large state like AP, and be just be an erstwhile princely state like
Mysore, Junagadh or Gwalior, it would have deteriorated and degenerated.
But because it became the capital of a large prosperous state with two
deltas, long coastline, minerals, Hyderabad prospered. Now if it were to
become the capital of a state with just 17 Lok Sabha seats and not much
economic activity in the hinterland of Hyderabad, then Hyderabad will
be lost even before the next 10 years. It will be an insignificant
metropolis,'' argues Parakala Prabhakar, a votary of united Andhra
Pradesh.
However, Telangana activists say that it is time
Seemandhra moved on, instead of crying hoarse that all is lost by losing
Hyderabad.
"If we took the same view, we would go to Bangalore
ten years ago. Because ten years ago, Hyderabad was not an IT hub,
Bangalore was. So you have to start somewhere. If you want to present
yourself as a location that is favourable and profitable, there is no
point saying, we lost Hyderabad," says Pingle.
But Hyderabad is
only one part of the issue in this tale of two states. The region whose
concerns are being ignored the most in this entire division debate is
Rayalaseema, which for all practical purposes, is even more backward
than Telangana. Not everyone is confident that the two regions of
coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema will continue as one state for too long.
They point out that culturally and in terms of prosperity and work
ethic, people from the two regions are very different. The apprehension
is that Rayalaseema will be seen by people of coastal Andhra as a
burden, almost like poor cousins. Especially since the region does not
have the kind of resource base that coastal Andhra has.
"Rayalaseema's
concerns and future are far more important than Hyderabad. Far too many
people are focusing on Hyderabad. But we are ignoring central issue of
16 million people. They are most backward districts of India. There is a
genuine sense of being orphaned. If we do not address that, we are not
really finding a solution,'' says Jayaprakash Narayan.
Which is
why there is almost a consensus that Rayalaseema that consists of four
districts may want to break away from coastal Andhra, sooner than later.
That a trifurcation of present-day Andhra Pradesh will most certainly
take place.
G Omkarnath, Professor of Economics at Hyderabad
Central University sees an unviability in terms of Seemandhra surviving
as one unit. "There would soon be forces who would play up in
Rayalaseema. The same forces who came in Telangana will say look, we in
Rayalaseema have our own identity and become a third state instead of
two states, sooner or later. It calls for tremendous institutional
engineering, political statesmanship, vision on part of polity as a
whole,'' says Prof Omkarnath.
When advertising professionals
Shashi Vadana Reddy and S K Swaroop got married 13 years ago, the fact
that Shashi hails from Telangana and Swaroop from Vizag in coastal
Andhra, hardly mattered. But now in a situation where Andhra Pradesh is
about to be cut into two, Shashi has to walk that extra mile to ensure
peace in her household. She says divisions run so deep that people from
her side of the family do not even want to give one of their daughters
in matrimony to a boy from coastal Andhra.
"Sometimes it becomes a
bit heated. For instance, when my aunt comes over. She is totally into
Telangana and has very extreme views on it. When she comes over, I make
sure Swaroop is not around,'' says Shashi Vadana Reddy.
But it is
not so hush-hush when it comes to Telugu films. The manner in which the
Telugu film industry, dominated by people from coastal Andhra, portray
people from Telangana as comedians, has always been a grouse with those
from the region. If a new wave of Telangana filmmakers emerge, that
could change though the argument is that films should be made for all
nine crore Telugus and not for four crore in Telangana, five crore in
Seemandhra and two crore living outside the state.
Eminent film
producer D Suresh Babu predicts that there will be one set of filmmakers
on both sides who will try to make extreme regional films. "If they
have a broader appeal, they will do well across. But if they have only
local appeal, they will do well only locally and will slowly die out.
Because business needs better films. So they will also come back - the
bigger Telangana director and the bigger Vizag director,'' says Suresh
Babu.
The situation is worse when it comes to those practising
purist cultural traditions. Varsha Bhargavi, a member of the
International Dance Council of UNESCO, fears that dance forms that have
their roots in coastal Andhra will find the doors of Hyderabad city as
an art patron shut on them for ever.
"I feel the bifurcation will
really affect the dance forms in Andhra Pradesh especially those
performers based out of Vijayawada and Rajahmundry. Already many of them
are not allowed to performed in Hyderabad city, which is really the
place for the performing arts. We have seen a lot of negative views on
Andhra Natyam dance form when we were performing at the Kakatiya dance
festival in Warangal last year. We had to announce it as a temple dance
tradition instead of Andhra Natyam,'' says Varsha Bhargavi.
If
the borders of Andhra Pradesh are redrawn, future generations will
witness water wars. That is the prediction, Seemandhra politicians like
Kiran Kumar Reddy and Jaganmohan Reddy are making. Their argument is
that river water sharing will at best be on paper, but never implemented
in letter and spirit by the upper riparian state, which in this case
will be Telangana.
Given the confrontationist nature of river
water sharing disputes between Karnataka and Tamilnadu and even
Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, people from Seemandhra region predict that
this division will sound the deathknell for agriculture in coastal
Andhra. They point to Andhra Pradesh's experience with Tungabhadra which
is jointly managed by Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.
"We hardly
get 50 per cent of the water allotted to us in any year. In the years of
flooding, anyway water will come. But in normal years, we do not even
get water that is allotted to us. So now you will have another state
created and this state with all its resources can utilise all this
water. Who are you going to tell? What are we doing to Karnataka?'' says
Somayajulu.
Interestingly, experts predict that Telangana
region, that is largely dependent on borewells and tanks, and has seen
many farmers burdened by debt killing themselves after their crop
failed, could now see its agriculture take a turn for the better.
"Telangana
agriculture might show more dynamism. Because they don't have a history
of irrigation. Traditionally they have had tank irrigation but now
tanks have been closing down due to real estate take over. But as they
get more and more into river-based irrigation system, it will improve.
Already Karimnagar, according to the Srikrishna committee report, is the
rice bowl of Telangana. And the rice millers assocation of Karimnagar
is very powerful politically,'' says Omkarnath.
Union ministers
like Purandareswari and Pallam Raju from Seemandhra, reconciled to the
inevitability of bifurcation, are now bargaining for a hefty package to
develop the new state. But it will not be easy to attract private
capital, unless juicy carrots are dangled. J A Chowdhary, Chief Mentor
of The Indus Entrepreneurs points out that if any industrialist has to
set up operations in Seemandhra, he will look for incentives such as tax
breaks, both sales tax and income tax.
Analysts also warn
Seemandhra against making the mistake Andhra Pradesh did and advise the
state's future rulers to develop several industrial hubs across the two
regions.
But it is not as if everything is hunky dory for
Telangana state. Over focussing on Hyderabad could be a strategic error
as would be to use the city only as a money-minting machine for the
state exchequer. Experts point out that huge differences within
Telangana - between a tribal Adilabad and a Mahbubnagar prone to large
scale migrations - will have to be reconciled in a more socialist
development ecosystem.
Many like chief minister Kiran Kumar Reddy
have argued that the lights will be off the moment Telangana becomes a
separate state. That is because it will be a power deficit state.
Telangana region now produces 57 million units in a day, but consumes
about 115 million units. If the lift irrigation schemes in Telangana
were to be implemented, it would need another 175 million units
everyday. Which means the state will face a daily shortfall of over 200
million units. The result will either be loadshedding or a drain on the
state exchequer to buy power from other states.
Telangana leaders
admit the power situation will remain a concern in a future new state
but say they will manage it. "Hyderabad is the hinterland of Telangana
and is the economic engine that drives Andhra Pradesh today and will
drive Telangana tomorrow. So Telangana being a surplus state can buy
power from Andhra or Chhattisgarh and if we get grid connectivity, even
from the north east. If power is the only issue, there are avenues to
make up for the deficit. But yes, we admit that Telangana as on today
will be short on power," says K T Rama Rao, TRS leader.
For the
last four years, Andhra Pradesh has been a house divided, a case of Us
versus Them, with the differences on regional lines completely exposed.
But the real test starts now. For people in both states. They need to
ensure that while united they stood, divided too they will not fall.
