Supreme example of bungling

When the nation is celebrating its Independence Day and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is all set to deliver his tenth, probably his last, address from the ramparts of the Red Fort in a few hours, the Telugu-speaking people are utterly unhappy and bitterly divided. Singh had said in his first Independence Day speech in 2004 that, “I have no promises to make, only promises to keep”.

Demerger of Andhra Pradesh was one of the promises the Congress party had made, rightly or wrongly, in its election manifesto. Nobody thought at the time of elections that Manmohan Singh would become Prime Minister and lead the UPA dispensation. It was taken as a promise made by Sonia Gandhi in her capacity as president of the Congress party. The mandate also belonged to her. The bizarre developments that led to Sonia renouncing the position but keeping the power are too fresh in public memory to merit repetition.

While Andhra Pradesh had done a great deal to keep the Congress party in power by providing the maximum number of MPs for any State in 2004 as well as in 2009 general elections, the ruling party, in turn, has done the greatest damage to the State through an act of unmitigated ungratefulness by encouraging internecine struggle and throwing it in a turmoil. The poor people of AP are not fortunate enough to hear a word from Sonia about their concerns.

She seldom opens her mouth. She spoke of the party’s intention to form a separate State of Telangana, not in so many words but indirectly, at an election meeting at Karimnagar more than nine years ago. Since then Home Ministers and the AICC general secretaries supposed to be in charge of AP have spoken a lot. Even when a number of MPs and MLAs belonging to her own party from Coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema resigned en masse following the announcement made by Chidambaram, then Home Minister, on December 9, 2009, which happens to be Sonia’s birthday, she chose to remain silent. The people in Seemandhra have been seething with anger and smarting under a sense of betrayal, but there has not been a word of assurance from Sonia Gandhi.

The people in Telangana have been waiting with bated breath to know if the Congress would be back-pedaling as it did after the historic announcement by Chidambaram which was followed by resignation drama. K Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR), chief of the Telangana Praja Samithi (TRS), is another remote player who comes out of his farmhouse, creates a sensation by uttering something provocative and withdraws to the farm. His gift of the gab is considered a curse by some people. Whatever he says is mostly misunderstood by people on the other side of the divide, more because of the way he says than what he says. And he has the knack of saying the right thing at the wrong time and keeping quiet when he should be saying something.

For instance, the place for him at present is not the farmhouse but Parliament House. KCR’s comment, immediately after the CWC decision was announced, on the options for the employees after the division, was the spark that was enough to ignite trouble in Seemandhra which has been on the boil for more than a fortnight. Sonia and KCR are not the only leaders responsible for this sad state of affairs, though. There are many others.

The series of developments engineered by the Congress party since 2001, with a view to dislodging Chandrababu Naidu in Hyderabad and Vajpayee in Delhi, led almost all political parties, barring the CPM and the MIM, to get stuck in a catch-22 situation. You are damned if you support the demand for a separate State of Telangana and you are damned if you don’t. There is some sort of consensus on the issue among the people in Telangana. That was why the Congress and the TDP had to enter into electoral understanding with the TRS. Of the two main players who strongly impacted the lives of the people of the State, YS Rajasekhara Reddy made his tragic exit. Had he survived the copter crash, the course of history would have been different altogether. Naidu, the other tall leader, is now unable to either swallow or vomit. He is suffering from throw-ups, not able to digest what is going on. The TDP is committed to Telangana but its leadership is not prepared for it.

We have a chief minister who has been sulking ever since the CWC made the decision. Kiran Kumar Reddy wants to give an impression to the party high command that he would cooperate in implementing the decision while, at the same time, he has political compulsion to send signals to his voters that he is not cooperating. He is caught in a jam. Kiran Reddy has a habit of sitting tight at his camp office, skipping the office of the chief minister at the Secretariat, whenever there is trouble in the party. He did not attend his office for several days when the ministers from Telangana were trying to submit their resignations in support of their demand. He is now repeating the act.

Venkaiah Naidu is another senior politician who looks like a square peg in a round hole. As a BJP leader, he has reason to be critical of the party for not doing the homework. He could have taken a group of leaders with him on a tour of Seemandhra region and counseled patience, assuring them that no injusitice would be allowed to be done. Sitaram Yechuri who spoke so well in the Rajya Sabha on the issue, should have proposed such an effort.

The fact of the matter is that no political leader is prepared to douse the fire. Everyone wants to take advantage of it. It is true that common people have many apprehensions about irrigation, power and jobs. They have to be addressed either by the government or the Opposition or a group of political leaders. Is it not the duty of the party leadership to convince MPs and MLAs? Be it the Congress or the TDP, is it fair to add fuel to fire by indulging in competitive populism instead of reassuring the people that they would take up the issues and get answers to their questions?

The movement in Seemandhra should not be understood as something driven by politicians. Common people are emotionally involved in it. They need to be persuaded to see reason.

Someone has to tell them their fears are unfounded. River waters would be shared according to the decisions made by tribunals and a mechanism could be evolved to address their security concerns in Hyderabad. All this would be possible if politicians were truthful. Every politician is thinking of next election. Sonia Gandhi also has been accused of doing the same thing.

This has been the tragedy with our politicians. Deception is mistaken as tactics. The unethical principle that has been made popular by unprincipled politicians is: You can do anything to win elections; you can do anything after winning. The anti-defection law is there. But there is no anti-deception law on our statute.

Huge faith in tactics made everyone complacent. Naidu, who is a hundred percent integrationist at heart, was so sure that the UPA-II could not grant statehood to Telangana that he went on pushing the T ball towards the goal post. He was shocked when Sonia suddenly hit the goal through a solo shot from deep inside the other half. The goal post was deserted as none thought the ball would be coming that way. Ministers and MPs from Seemandhra have been accusing Kiran Reddy of misleading them into believing that the party high command would never decide in favour of Telangana. They are furious with Kiran and PCC president Botcha Satyanarayana who were informed about the decision at least one week before the CWC passed the resolution but preferred to keep it to themselves.

A majority of the aides of Sonia Gandhi, supposed to help her in taking a decision, are professed integrationists. Defence Minister Antony himself is said to be against division of any State. Digvijay holds the same view. So is the case with Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde. Ahmed Patel is the political secretary to the Congress president. His job is to see that the boss’s decisions are implemented faithfully by generally unfaithful leaders. On watching the developments in the Congress party, one gets a feeling that the advisers are bent on failing Sonia in this case. Otherwise, they would have told her that a lot of homework needed to be done before announcing a decision on a sensitive issue like dividing a State against the wishes of half of the people, if not more. They cannot say they were short of time.

Since December 9, 2009, more than three years and hundreds of suicides have passed. An emotional debate has been going on. The atmosphere in the State is surcharged with sentiments. Fears and suspicions are growing by the day. The CWC should have asked the party leadership to first speak to its MPs and MLAs and convince them of the inevitability of division and allay their fears. Talk about the benefits of being two States, developing new growth centres and increasing employment potential and business opportunities instead of living in one house quarreling for decades without an iota of truthfulness, love or affection. After bringing the Congress leaders in Telangana and Seemandhra regions on a single platform and persuading them to accept the decision of the party, the Opposition parties should have been approached.

Digvijay Singh is the only national leader who has been talking on behalf of the Congress high command. No useful purpose would be served by repeating that there is no going back on the decision. Everyone knows it would be suicidal for the Congress party. Digvijay should, instead, have summoned all the party leaders from Seemandhra or he should have visited Hyderabad and advised them to cooperate.

The least that the Congress party can do now is to bring peace to Seemandhra at any cost. The UPA-II can think of organizing an all-party meeting, as suggested by Chandrababu Naidu, and solicit the support of the Opposition parties. The ways and means of removing fears from the hearts of Seemandhra people should be discussed. On a lighter side, if it could be excused at this juncture, the Congress should change the name of its place of strategic meetings from “War Room” to “Peace Room”. It should try to make peace and not war which has been the case for ten years.

The war of attrition between the Congress and the BJP, on the one side, and between the Congress and the TDP, on the other side, and between the Congress and the YSRCP on yet another side has brought the lives of the Telugu-speaking people to the precipice of danger. They are now painted as quarrelsome, litigious, inhuman and narrow-minded. This has erased the fact that the Telugus have a great history, a rich culture and hoary traditions. They don’t deserve this ‘reward’ for what they did to the Congress.