dna edit: Telangana tangle

The Congress stance was shaped in 2004 when it allied with the Telangana Rashtra Samithi. The promise was to set up the second state reorganisation commission to look at demands for new states. The commission was not set up. The reason for the failure to look at the issue of the demand for new states is that Congress remains an imperialist and imperious party, which believes that it is duty bound to preserve the unity of the country. It is the 1947 hang-up.

Whatever the political motive, the Bharatiya Janata Party believes in the idea of smaller states, and it is therefore quite clear in its stand over the issue. The Congress lacks the conceptual clarity in the matter, and it leads to hesitancy, delay and clumsy action. When Hyderabad and Andhra states merged in 1956 to become present-day Andhra Pradesh, there were unresolved issues which were papered over. Nehru did not like the idea of linguistic states in the first place, and once he came round to accepting it he did not much favour two states speaking the same language. It was perhaps understandable that Congress at that time did not like smaller states when the process of merging over 550 principalities in the Indian Union was still fresh in memory.

It was only in 2013 that the party picked up the courage to announce the formation of Telangana. It did not anticipate the determined protest and opposition from the Andhra side. There was need for time to smoothen the ruffled feathers all round, and calm anxieties and apprehensions. The Congress-led UPA governments went through the ritual motions of consultation among all the parties, at the state and national levels. There was no effort to address the contentious issues and there were many, including that of the status of Hyderabad.

The Congress political calculations overshadowed the formation of Telangana. The party was looking for ways of not losing electoral ground in the Andhra region, while retaining its hold in Telangana. It is with this in mind that the party looked on with indulgence at the loud protests from the Andhra members in Parliament and the defiant stand of Chief Minister N  Kiran Kumar Reddy and his Andhra colleagues in the government and in the state assembly. And before Congress at the state and in the centre could realise, Reddy’s rebellion had become an embarrassment and it has also created a political impasse.

It is the electoral compulsion that will rule every move of every party, and it should not come as a surprise if Congress finds it impossible to push through the Telangana bill in the last session of the present parliament starting on February 5. The BJP and other parties which favour the formation of Telangana are unwilling to bail out a cornered Congress in the matter.

There will be lessons that the Congress will be forced to learn from this. It will have to clarify to itself its stand on small states, and what it means for the federal system. It will have to make clear its stance over a strong federal system which would imply a central government that can continue to play a domineering role in domestic governance. Congress cannot any more afford the luxury of an unthinking national party which shuts its eyes to uncomfortable reality. The formation of Telangana is imminent, but the Congress could have saved itself and the country unnecessary stress and trauma if it had taken a firm stance and not opted for pusillanimous expediency.