EDITS | Tuesday, December 15, 2009 | Email | Print | 
Not the time for petty politics
A Surya Prakash
Ever since the Union Government signalled its readiness to consider the demand for a separate Telangana State, demands for new States have erupted like a rash across the length and breadth of India. The political class is stunned by the sudden burst of parochial sentiments in all regions of the country and is desperately groping for a way to contain the conflagration. While some demands for new States can be traced to crass opportunism, there are others like Telangana and Vidarbha, which seem to have greater legitimacy because of the recommendations of States Reorganisation Commission which considered these demands 54 years ago. However, whatever the merits of each case, the country’s political leadership will have to scrupulously avoid knee-jerk responses if it wishes to douse the provincial bushfires triggered by Telangana and address the demands on the basis of well-accepted principles.
The broad principles laid down by the SRC in 1955 for creation of new States holds good even today. It favoured the creation of linguistic States, but language was not the only criteria. It said national unity, linguistic and cultural homogeneity, geographical compactness and economic and administrative considerations must be factored in.
Fears of neglect within a linguistic region must be taken note of and a “balanced approach” should be evolved. This “balanced approach” meant recognition of linguistic homogeneity as an important factor “but not to consider it as an exclusive and binding principle, over-riding all other considerations, administrative, financial or political”. It also meant rejection of the “one language, one State” theory “because there can be more than one State speaking the same language” (as in the Hindi belt). Yet another consideration was that the decision in regard to new States should inject “deeper content to Indian nationalism”. It is perilous to overlook these principles, whether in the 1950s or now. If petty politics overrides well laid down international standards, it could weaken national unity, governance and economic growth.
The creation of linguistic States has its origins in the fast unto death undertaken by Potti Sriramulu, a Gandhian and freedom fighter in October 1952 to press for a separate Telugu-speaking State to be carved out of the state of Madras. Jawaharlal Nehru’s Government misjudged the situation and failed to intervene in time. Sriramulu died on December 16 that year, leading to riots in the Andhra region. Such was the scale of the violence that Nehru was forced to concede the demand for a Telugu-speaking State in Parliament three days after Sriramulu’s death. The State was formally inaugurated on October 1, 1953. But the point to note is that Telangana, which was part of the princely state of Hyderabad, was not part of this State. After conceding the demand for a separate Andhra, the Government constituted an SRC headed by Justice Fazl Ali. KM Panikkar and HN Kunzru were its members.
The commission considered the conflicting demands for a composite Telugu State and for a separate Telangana. It said Vishalandhra would bring the development of the Krishna and Godavari rivers under a unified command and also solve the problem of finding a permanent capital for the State, “for the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad are very well suited to be the capital of Vishalandhra”. However, Telangana “may be converted into a colony” by the enterprising people in coastal Andhra. On the other hand, from a fiscal point of view, Telangana would be a “stable and viable unit” with higher land and excise revenue. It, therefore, concluded that “it will be in the interests of Andhra as well as Telangana if, for the present, the Telangana area is constituted into a separate State, which may be known as the Hyderabad State”, with provision for its unification with Andhra later, if by a two-thirds majority the legislature of the residuary Hyderabad State favoured unification”. The intervening period could be utilised to allay apprehensions and achieve “consensus of opinion necessary for a real union...”. However, “if conditions congenial to the unification of the two areas do not materialise and if public sentiment in Telangana crystallises itself against the unification of the two States, Telangana will have to continue as a separate unit”.
The commission said the leaders of Andhra were willing to offer safeguards to Telangana in case of integration but it was not possible to dispel the fears in Telangana via constitutional devices like the ‘Scottish devolution’ in the UK. The Union Government, however, rejected the recommendation and merged Telangana with Andhra to create a unified Telugu-speaking State on November 1, 1956, the date on which several more linguistic States were inaugurated.
The same argument of linguistic homogeneity was advanced before the commission by those who demanded that eight Marathi-speaking districts of Madhya Pradesh (known as Maha Vidarbha) must be part of Maharashtra. Here too the commission found that revenue-surplus Vidarbha could suffer if it was part of revenue-deficit Maharashtra. Nagpur would be overshadowed by Bombay and land and tenancy laws would be altered to its disadvantage. It, therefore, recommended creation of a separate Vidarbha State, which would be “stable and prosperous”. This recommendation was rejected and Vidarbha was merged into the composite Marathi-speaking State of Maharashtra. The persistent cries for statehood that have emanated from these two regions over the last 50 years seem to indicate that the issues that warranted separateness remain alive even 50 years after the reorganisation of States.
This is a testing time for the country’s politicians. This is also the time for statesmanship, not one-upmanship. Instead of scoring petty political points to embarrass one another, national parties like the Congress, the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Left parties need to work towards a common goal — the formulation of objective criteria for division of existing States or the formation of new States and reference of all demands to a new SRC. Seasoned players like Mr Pranab Mukherjee and Mr LK Advani will have to take the initiative to evolve a national response to the developing situation, if we are to preserve our hard-earned unity. In short, if there are any statesmen in our midst, this is the time for them to stand up and be counted.
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