Political Diary

New Delhi, 12 December 2009

Flip-Flop On Telangana

NO LESSONS LEARNT

By Poonam I Kaushish

“Yeh madhumakhi ka chatha hai, chedho ge toh pashtaoh ge”. RJD supremo Laloo Yadav’s remark over the creation of Jharkhand in 2000 has come to haunt India as never before. Thanks to the UPA Government’s knee-jerk `statehood-at-midnight" drama on carving out Telangana from Andhra Pradesh. Reminding one of the famous adage: We learn nothing from history except that we learn nothing from history!

Undoubtedly, 11 days of fasting seems to have done what 8 years of bargaining could not achieve for Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) chief K. Chandrasekhar Rao: the assurance of a separate State of Telangana from a reluctant Centre. Triggering of the mass resignation of over 130 MLAs in a 292 Assembly and 32 MPs across party lines. What to speak of violence in Rayalaseema and Coastal Andhra.

Undoubtedly, fear that Naxalites would capitalise on the pro-Statehood movement given their strong presence in Telangana region along-with the growing evidence that leaders opposed to ‘weak’ CM Rosaiah were fishing in the troubled Telangana waters, were the principal triggers. The decision was also facilitated that it was time to cede the demand, hanging fire since 55 years, post its endorsement in the Common Minimum Programme in 2004. No matter that the late CM strongman Rajashekhar Reddy steamrolled the Telangana region on an anti-Telangana plank in the simultaneous Assembly and Lok Sabha polls last May.

Further, as a senior leader admitted, it was felt that Telangana with 17 Lok Sabha and 119 Assembly seats, could play out to be a strong Party turf vis-a-vis Chandrababu Naidu’s TDP. The icing on the cake was KCR’s assurance to merge with Congress post-Statehood. Bluntly, a virtue was made out of a necessity. Only to hastily backtrack, push the pause button with mud on its face.

True, the Centre may have been put the issue in the thanda baaksa but it has exposed that that the bigness and smallness of a State has little to do with national interest but everything to do with crass opportunism, massaging its vote-banks and improving the Congress’s winability quotient. In the hope that the smaller units will fetch the Party big political dividends. Camouflaged as imperative for “political stability” in the country (read Party), it has mooted the idea of setting up another States Reorganisation Commission ((last suggested in July 2007) to explore the formation of new States. No matter that till its electoral rout in UP in May 2006, the Party had opposed tooth and nail the creation of small States. It even let the Telengana Rashtriya Samiti quit the UPA alliance.

Recall, the UPA had set-up a sub-committee under Pranab Mukherjee (who else?) but as it had failed to reach a consensus, the decision was left to the Congress High Command, read Sonia. It remains to be seen whether the Congress-led UPA Government will come out smelling of roses or reek of rotten eggs this time round.

Adding to Centre’s headache KCR’s ‘fasting success’‘ has once again opened the Pandora’s Box for a renewed demand for 10 separate States. BSP’s Mayawati favours bifurcation of UP --- Harit Pradesh out of Western UP and  Bundelkhand out of south-eastern UP. Leaders in  Maharashtra have raised the ante Vidarbha.

The BJP Darjeeling MP has raised the flag for Gorkhaland in West Bengal. Which the CPM’s opposes. Then there is a demand for Saurashtra in Gujarat, of Coorg in Karnataka,  Gondwana from portions of Chhattisgarh, Andhra and Madhya Pradesh, Kodagu from Karnataka’s coffee belt, Bodoland from Assam, Ladakh and Jammu from Kashmir, Garoland from Meghalaya, Mithilanchal from North Bihar and Gorkhaland.

As for the Made in India regional leaders the less said the better. They are prone to blowing hot and cold depending on what suits them politically at the moment. Playing on the emotions of the poor and backward regions and sub-regions aspiring to be full-fledged States. Be it the TDP, RJD, Samajwadi, DMK et al. Remember Naidu was gung-ho on Telangana during the agitation only to eat his words once the issue snowballed on him.

Nobody can deny that a few States in India are much too large and unwieldy for efficient governance. It takes nearly two days to get from one end of UP to the other by road! Obviously, administrative efficiency is the first casualty. As the2000 experience of Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, and, earlier, of Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, shows, smaller States are able to meet better the rising expectations of their people for speedy development and a responsive and effective administration. Today, all are shining examples of “small is beautiful.”

Logically, if one district of Assam could be made into a full-fledged State of Nagaland, another into Mizoram, a third into Meghalaya and yet another into Arunachal Pradesh, how can one hold back on Telengana or Vidarbha?

However, protagonists of bigger States disagree, often sharply. What guarantee, they ask, is there that this will end internal fissures. Make the rivers flow smoothly from one State to another. Merely look at the ugly riparian fight between Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, Andhra and Tamil Nadu and Punjab and Haryana.  Or that Goa has had 16 Chief Ministers in 22 years,  that a Government lasted only 10 days in Meghalaya last year.

What warranty that it would decrease the ever-rising disparities between the haves and the have-nots which are all the more glaring and difficult to camouflage in small states. Clinching their arguments by asserting that with caste and creed dictating the polity’s agenda presently, any fresh redrawing of India’s political map would only give monstrous fillip to separatism.

Take the case of Jharkhand. That state, carved out of southern Bihar in 2000, demonstrates that small isn’t always beautiful. See how Koda  milked the State of over Rs 4000 crores. Clearly, hiving off new States should not come to mean a panacea to development, resource allocation and governance.

Besides, it may make sound political sense but lousy economics. When the Prime Minister goes blue in the face talking of cutting back on costs and austerity drive, we continue to multiply our expenses. Authoritative sources aver that the creation of a State would cost the national exchequer over Rs 1,200 crore. Entailing expenditure on setting up a new State capital, Assembly and Secretariat but excluding the annual recurring expenses.

In addition, it could well encourage fissiparous tendencies, ultimately leading to India’s balkanization and stoke the sub-terranean smouldering fires of disputes over borders--- and cities. Both Haryana and Punjab still claim Chandigarh. Orissa demands the return of Saraikala and Kharsuan. Nagaland still wants to cut into large chunks of Manipur and certain forest areas of Assam to create Nagalim. Bihar yearns desperately for the mineral-rich districts of Jharkhand.

Will not a further partition of the existing States result in an India that would fit Jinnah’s classical description of Pakistan as being “truncated and moth-eaten”? The only purpose it will serve will be to whet regional and separatist appetites, as it happened at the time of the first SRC in the mid-fifties. The very “black hole” that our past leaders were ever eager to avoid.

The tragic irony of history is that successive Prime Ministers bought peace at the cost of strong integrated India by carving out new jagirs for acquiring “new chelas” and assured vote banks. Unfortunately for the Centre, its policy of going populist time and again and opting for quick-fix remedies has boomeranged. Our netas have to realize that statesmanship and sagacity lie in adopting the middle path.

In the ultimate , the UPA Government needs  to learn from the mistakes of the recently carved small States, diagnose the disease afresh and hammer out solutions for better governance. Instead of buying time and win votes. Much can be achieved through meaningful decentralization of administration in these days of computerization, without adding to the cost of governance through top-heavy ministerial baggage.

Let us not allow politicians of all hues to create new pocket boroughs motivated by petty personal interests, undermining national unity. Are we now going to roll back history to pre-Independence days and create 562 States? Time to bolt the barn door on this. Politics willing. ---- INFA

(Copyright, India News and Feature Alliance)