HISTORY:-
The Telangana movement refers to a group of related political activities organized to support the creation of a new state of Telangana
, from the existing state of Andhra Pradesh in South . The proposed new state corresponds to the
Telugu-speaking portions of the erstwhile princely state of
Hyderabad. On 30 July 2013, the
Congress Working Committee
approved recommending a motion for a separate Telangana to the central
government. The process of Telangana to be the 29th state of India with
10 Districts is expected to be completed in 4–5 months
once the Parliament passes an Act to create Telangana. Hyderabad will
be the joint capital of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana for 10 years.
History:-
In December 1953, the States Reorganization Commission was appointed to prepare for the creation of states on linguistic lines. The commission, due to public demand, recommended disintegration of Hyderabad state and to merge Marathi speaking region with
Bombay state and Kannada speaking region with
Mysore state. The
States Reorganisation Commission (SRC) discussed pros and cons of the merger of Telugu speaking Telangana region of
Hyderabad state with
Andhra state.
P SRC report said "The creation of Vishalandhra is an
ideal to which numerous individuals and public bodies, both in Andhra
and Telangana, have been passionately attached over a long period of
time, and unless there are strong reasons to the contrary, this
sentiment is entitled to consideration". Discussing the case of
Telangana, para 378 of the SRC report said "One of the principal causes
of opposition of Vishalandhra also seems to be the apprehension felt by
the educationally backward people of Telangana that they may be swamped
and exploited by the more advanced people of the coastal areas."
In its
final analysis SRC recommended against the immediate merger. In para 386
it said "After taking all these factors into consideration we have come
to the conclusions that it will be in the interests of Andhra as well
as Telangana, if for the present, the Telangana area is to constitute
into a separate State, which may be known as the Hyderabad State with
provision for its unification with Andhra after the general elections
likely to be held in or about 1961 if by a two thirds majority the
legislature of the residuary Hyderabad State expresses itself in favor
of such unification."
After going through the recommendations of the SRC, the then Central Government led by Jawaharlal Nehru
decided to merge Andhra state and Telangana to form Andhra Pradesh
state on 1 November 1956 after providing safeguards to Telangana in the
form of Gentleman's agreement.
pre-2004 telangana protests:-
12 years after the formation of Andhra Pradesh, people of Telangana
expressed dissatisfaction over how the agreements and guarantees were
implemented.
On 19 January 1969, an all party accord was reached to ensure the
proper implementation of Telangana safeguards. Telangana leaders were
not satisfied with the accord. The movement became violent and in some
instances police had to resort to firing to control the mobs.
The army had to be called in. After several days of talks with leaders
of both regions, on 12 April 1969, Prime minister came up with an eight
point plan.
Telangana leaders rejected the plan and protests continued under the leadership of newly formed political party Telangana Praja Samithi in 1969 asking for the formation of Telangana. Under the Mulki rules in force at the time, anyone who had lived in Hyderabad
for 15 years was considered a local, and was thus eligible for certain
government posts. When the Supreme Court upheld the Mulki rules at the
end of 1972, the Jai Andhra movement, with the aim of re-forming a separate state of Andhra, was started in Coastal Andhra and Rayalseema regions.
In 1985, when Telangana employees complained about the violations to
six point formula, government enacted government order 610 (GO 610) to
correct the violations in recruitment. As Telangana people complained
about non implementation of GO 610, in 2001, government constituted
Girglani commission to look into violations.
In 1997, the state unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) passed a resolution seeking a separate Telangana.
A new party called (TRS), led by Kalvakuntla Chandrashekar Rao (KCR), was formed in 2001 with the single-point agenda of creating a separate Telangana state with Hyderabad as its capital.
In 2001, the Congress Working Committee sent a resolution to the NDA
government for constituting a second SRC to look into the Telangana
state demand. This was rejected by then union home minister L.K. Advani
citing that smaller states were neither viable nor conducive to the
integrity of the country.
In April 2002, Advani wrote a letter to MP A. Narendra rejecting a
proposal to create Telangana state explaining that "regional disparities
in economic development could be tackled through planning and efficient
use of available resources". He said that the NDA government,
therefore, does "not propose creation of a separate state of Telangana" However in 2012, Advani said that if their then partner
TDP cooperated during NDA tenure, a separate state of Telangana could have been created.
Movement in 2004-2010:-
In the run-up to the 2004 Assembly & Parliament elections, then Union Home Minister
L. K. Advani
ruled out inclusion of Telangana in the NDA agenda and said "Unless
there is consensus among all political parties in the state and unless
that consensus is reflected in a resolution of the state Assembly, we
don’t propose to include it in the NDA agenda"
.
For these elections, the Congress party and the TRS forged an electoral
alliance in the Telangana region to consider the demand of separate
Telangana State. Congress came to power in the state and formed a
coalition government at the centre; TRS joined the coalition after the
common minimum program
of the coalition government included that the demand for separate
Telangana state will be considered after due consultations and
consensus.
In February 2009 the state government declared that it had no
objection, in principle, to the formation of separate Telangana and that
the time had come to move forward decisively on this issue. To resolve
related issues, the government constituted a joint house committee.
In the lead-up to the 2009 General Elections in India, all the major
parties in Andhra Pradesh supported the formation of Telangana.
In the 2009 elections TRS managed to win only 10 assembly seats out
of the 45 it contested and only 2 MP seats. Some media analysts thought
Telangana sentiment faded.
Within few months of getting re-elected as popular CM, Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy
(YSR) died in a helicopter crash in September 2009. This resulted in a
leadership crisis within the Congress party and also created a political
vacuum in the state.
During this time, TRS president
K. Chandrashekar Rao
(KCR) raised his pitch for the separate state. On 29 November 2009, he
started a fast-unto-death, demanding that the Congress party introduce a
Telangana bill in Parliament.
Student organisations, employee unions, and various organisations joined the movement.
General strikes shut down Telangana on 6 and 7 December.
In an all party meeting called by the state government on the night of 7
December to discuss regarding KCR's fast and how to handle it,
all major Opposition parties extended their support for a separate
state for Telangana. The state Congress and its ally Majlis-e-Ittehadul
Muslimeen have left it to the Congress high command to take a final
decision. Minutes of the meeting were faxed to Congress high command.
On 9 December 2009, Union Minister of Home Affairs
P. Chidambaram
announced that the Indian government would start the process of forming
a separate Telangana state, pending the introduction and passage of a
separation resolution in the Andhra Pradesh assembly. This resulted in
protests across both Andhra and
Rayalseema. Students, workers, lawyers & various organizations in the regions launched the
Samaikyandhra Movement demanding that the state be kept united.
MLAs from these regions also submitted their resignations in protest seeking a reversal of the home minister's statement.
On 23 December, keeping in view the reactions of people of other
regions, the Government of India announced that no action on Telangana
will be taken until a consensus is reached by all parties and groups in
the state.
Coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema region MLAs started withdrawing their
resignations while MLAs and ministers from Telangana started submitting
their resignations, and demanded that the Centre take immediate steps to
initiate the process of bifurcating Andhra Pradesh.
A
Joint Action Committee
(also known as JAC or TJAC) comprising political and non-political
groups was formed to lead the demand for separate Telangana with
Osmania University professor
M Kodandaram Reddy as its convenor.
BJP leader and leader of opposition in Lok Sabha, Sushma Swaraj in
2010 said that they would have formed the Telangana State along with
Jharkhand, Chattisgarh and Uttarakhand in year 2000 but the Telugu
Desam, which extended outside support to it, opposed the plan.
On 3 February, the government appointed a five-member committee headed by Justice SriKrishna to look into the issue.
2010:Srikrishna Committee:-
The Srikrishna Committee toured all the regions of state extensively
and invited people from all sections of the society to give their
opinion on the statehood. It received over one lakh petitions and
representations from political parties, organisations, NGOs and
individuals. It also held consultations with political parties and
general public while also factoring in the impact of recent developments
on different sections of people such as women, children, students,
minorities, Other Backward Classes, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled
Tribes.
On 16 December 2010, two weeks before the deadline for the submission
of the Srikrishna report, TRS organized a public meeting in
Warangal. It was estimated that 1.2 to 1.5 million people
attended this meeting. It was reported that even more would have
attended, but were stranded due to traffic jams along roads leading to
the city. TRS president K. Chandrasekhar Rao appealed to Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh
to note that the people of Telangana were losing patience. He demanded
that the Centre introduce the Bill on Telangana in the next session of
Parliament.
[43][44][45][46]
Days before the
Srikrishna committee submitted its report to the Central government, KCR declared that his party was ready to wash
Sonia Gandhi's
feet if she agrees to the Telangana demand. He said his party is
associated with the movement and was willing to dissolve the party if
the state was formed.
In an all-party meeting on 6 January 2011, which was boycotted by the TRS, BJP and TDP, the Home ministry released the 505-page
Srikrishna committee
. The report discusses six solutions to the problem. The preferred
option is keeping the State united by simultaneously providing certain
definite constitutional and statutory measures for socio-economic
development and political empowerment of Telangana region through the
creation of a statutorily-empowered Telangana Regional Council. The
second best option is bifurcation of the State into Telangana and
Seemandhra as per existing boundaries, with Hyderabad as the capital of
Telangana and Seemandhra to have a new capital.
On 23 March 2011, Justice L Narasimha Reddy of Andhra Pradesh high
court ordered central government to make contents of 8th chapter of Sri
Krishna Committee, which was submitted in a sealed secret cover to the
centre.
Justice in his
60 page judgement
said "The Committee travelled beyond the terms of reference in its
endeavour to persuade the Union of India not to accede to the demand for
Telangana". The judgement also quoted the SKC report's 8th chapter and
said "The manoeuvre suggested by the Committee in its secret
supplementary note poses an open challenge, if not threat, to the very
system of democracy."
On 26 April, a division bench comprising the Chief Justice of the AP
high court has stayed the order of Justice L Narasimha Reddy who had
directed the Centre to make public the secret Chapter.
2011 Non Cooperation Movement and Million March:-
On 17 February 2011 noncooperation movement was started which lasted
for 16 days with participation by 300,000 government employees. It
caused a loss of Rs 8 billion per day in revenue to government.
In February and March, Assembly session was boycotted for weeks and
Parliament session was disrupted for several days by Telangana
representatives.
Million March was organised by Telangana JAC in Hyderabad on 10 March
2010. In a move to disrupt the march, police arrested over thousand
activists throughout the region and closed down entry to Hyderabad city
by stopping certain transportation services and diverting traffic.
Around 50,000 people reached the venue of the march, Tank Bund by hoodwinking police.
Telangana activists damaged 16 statues of personalities representing
Telugu culture language and threw some of the remnants into the lake.
In November 2011, Telangana Rashtra Samiti Vidyarthi Vibhagam ( TRSV)
state president Balki Suman was arrested by Hyderabad police after
cases were registered against him in connection with damaging statues on
Tank Bund during the 'Million March,' attacking police personnel,
damaging police and media vehicles.
On 12 September 2011, a day before Sakala Janula Samme(All people's
strike), TRS organised a public meeting in Karimnagar which was attended
by over a million people including
TJAC leaders, BJP and New Democracy party leaders.
Starting 13 September, as part of 'strike by all section of people'
supporting Telangana statehood, government employees throughout
Telangana stayed out of work, lawyers boycotted courts
and 60,000 coal miners of Singareni Collieries(SCCL Ltd.) also joined the strike.
Soon government teachers, state road transport corporation employees and state electricity board employees joined the strike.
On a call given by JAC, road blockades on national highways throughout Telangana, rail blockade and the strike of
auto rikshaw union were organized on 24 and 25 September causing disruption in transport services.
Virtually all sections of people joined this strike.
On 30 September, as the strike entered the 18th day, even while
Congress central leadership met several Telangana congress leaders, JAC
called a bundh in Hyderabad city.
On 2 October, JAC leaders, employee unions leaders and TRS leaders
including KCR met Prime minister to explain the situation in Telangna
due to the strike and asked to expedite the decision on the statehood
demand.
The strike has resulted in an unprecedented power crisis in the state
with only 223 MU of power generated against the demand of 275MU
impacting both the industry and agriculture.
On 29 October 2011, three Congress party MLAs belonging to Telangana
region resigned and joined TRS in protest as they were diappointed with
Congress leadership's delay in Telangana state formation.
On 1 November, Congress MLA Komatireddy Venkat Reddy started an
indefinite hunger strike until the central government announced a
roadmap for Telangana state.
5 days later, the fast was broken when police arrested him under
Section 309 of IPC (attempt to commit suicide) and shifted him to NIMS,
Hyderabad where he was kept under intravenous fluids. He ended his fast
on 9 November.
97-year old Freedom fighter Konda Laxman Bapuji also launched his
week-long satyagraha at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi, demanding statehood
to the region.
On 14 August 2012, KCR gave a deadline to the centre to declare
statehood in 2 weeks and promised to launch another round of agitation
if the centre doesn't.
He later declared that he got feelers that a positive announcement will be made by Eid.
In another interview after Eid, he remarked that Sonia Gandhi has
always been in favour of Telangana and that the central government will
call his party for discussions in "few weeks or so"
On 6 September, KCR left for Delhi and announced that the issue will be resolved by end of September.
After his 23-day stay in Delhi, KCR returned to Hyderabad hoping for a
final round of talks with the Congress leadership on the issue. He
claimed that his discussions with several leaders was fruitful.
All Party Meeting In December:-
On 28 December 2012 a meeting was organised by Sushilkumar Shinde,
Home minister of India to discuss the Telangana issue. It was atteneded
by 8 political parties having significant presence in the state
legislature. After hearing views of all the parties, the home minister
said that this will be the last such meeting on this issue and that the
government will come up with a decision within 30 days. In the meeting,
MIM & CPI(M) reiterated their strong opposition to division of the
state. YSR Congress remained neutral and requested the central
government to take a decision. Congress representatives gave conflicting
views, one supporting the division & one opposing it.
TDP representatives gave a letter signed by its president which said
that it never withdrawn its letter to Pranab Mukharjee in 2008
supporting Telangana state formation.
Telangana JAC demanaded more clarity from Telugu Desam before they allow TDP to be a member of JAC.
2013 Revolution:-
Chalo Assembly:-
In May 2013, the TJAC gave a call to lay siege to the state
legislative Assembly in Hyderabad on 14 June 2013 to demand the
formation of Telangana. Government refused permission to the march as
they had information that anti-social elements might participate in the
event and cause violence like in previous events of
Sagara Haram and
Million March
where violence erupted despite promises made by the TJAC. Police made
pre-emptive arrests of activists through the region which led do
stalling of the assembly proceedings by opposition parties.
The chief minister directed the Director-General of Police at a
high-level review meeting not to use even rubber bullets in their
efforts and observe utmost restraint in maintaining law and order. Amid
fear of violence by Naxalites after an open letter claimed to have been written by them on the rally
police sounded a high alert across the state and almost sealed all the
arterial roads leading to the Assembly. Over 25,000 policemen belonging
to both central and state security forces were deployed. The TJAC
leaders alleged that the government has been using repressive measures
to prevent them from representing the aspirations of Telangana people in
a peaceful manner.
Educational institutions declared a holiday and public transport went
off the roads and shops and establishments shut as a precautionary
measure.
On the day of the event in spite of the restrictions placed, police
could not totally prevent Telangana activists from sneaking into prime
locations and making a vain bid to rush towards the Assembly.
Hundreds of people including state legislators, JAC Chaiman and other
leaders were arrested across the city. Osmania University campus
witnessed pitched battles as police closed the campus gate to stop
students leaving campus in a rally then resorted to tear gas shelling
when student started stone pelting. After the march, the TJAC Chairman
remarked that their goal to reach Assembly complex and highlight their
demand was fulfilled.
Congress Core Committee Meeting:-
On 30 July, the Congress Working Committee unanimously passed a
resolution for the creation of Telangana and requesting the central
government make steps in accordance with the constitution of India
to form Telangana within a definite timeframe. Andhra Pradesh and the
newly formed Telangana will share Hyderabad as their common capital for
10 years.
Ongole was suggested as a future capital of Andhra Pradesh.
The committee also assured that the concerns of people from the
remaining regions regarding sharing of water and power resources will be
addressed.
TRS welcomed the decision and its chief K. Chadrashekhar Rao said that his party is fine with Hyderabad being the joint capital.
This was seen as an attempt by the INC to merge TRS into itself for the
general and provincial election after being marginalised in the
Rayalseema and coastal regions by the .
A BJP state level leader gave credit for the move to Gujarat Chief
Minister Narendra Modi by saying that the move by Congress was in
reaction to Modi's tour to Hyderabad on 11 August. BJP national level leaders reacted by saying that the move was under pressure
and that their party supports the creation of Telangana and Vidarbha.
They demanded that other requests for the creation of new states such as
those of Gorkhaland and Bodoland
need to be done by appointing a Second States Reorganisation Commission
earlier too. We now demand that the government should set it up and
seek a report within a specific timeframe.
he next steps towards the re-formation of Telangana, expected by early
2014, are: The national cabinet sharing its plans with the President of
India and the Andhra Pradesh legislature. The Prime Minister would then
organise a committee to negotiate a consensus between the leaders from
the three regions for issues such as sharing revenue and water. Both
national houses of parliament would then have to pass a resolution to
create Telangana.
Final Decision On Telangana Statement:-
30 Jul 2013 ... The Telangana Rashtra Samiti has welcomed the endorsement of a separate state of Telangana by the UPA.
SONIA GANDHI CLEARS TALANGANA dIVISON, FINAL DESICION AWAITED.
