POINT BLANK: War on terror: Playing both sides

By M H Ahssan

While the Pakistan army claims to be bleeding the Islamists, there is no independent confirmation of these claims.

The most remarkable aspect of the war on terror that is purportedly being fought on both sides of the Durand line is the sheer lack of trust, not only between adversaries but also between allies. By extending drone attacks into the settled districts of NWFP, the US has yet again delivered an unambiguous message that it will not hesitate to strike unilaterally against terrorist targets inside Pakistan. More than anything else, the attack on an al-Qaeda safe house in Bannu demonstrates US’ lack of confidence in the ability, willingness and commitment of Pakistani security agencies in combating the Islamists. Clearly, the US is not ready to share information with the Pakistanis and let them take the lead in anti-terror operations because they are not sure if the information will not be leaked to the intended targets, some of who: Hafiz Gul Bahadur, Mullah Nazir, Jalaluddin Haqqani, to name a few, retain close links with Pakistani intelligence agencies.

Even though senior US civil and military officials appreciate Pakistani efforts to curb Islamist insurgency, particularly after the military action in Bajaur and Swat, the suspicion that the Pakistanis are playing both sides outweighs the praise. There are good reasons for the doubts about Pakistan that continue to linger in the minds of US officials. After all, why has a much-vaunted fighting force like the Pakistan army not been able to oust the Taliban from Bajaur and Swat for over three months despite using heavy artillery, fighter jets, helicopter gunships and tanks? It is said that the Taliban are very well dug behind an intricate network of defensive earthworks. But if the Taliban are fighting a conventional conflict, then why has the Pakistan army deployed only around 10,000 troops in Bajaur? Why not 40,000 or even more? While the Pakistan army claims to be bleeding the Islamists, there is no independent confirmation of these claims. For all anybody knows, these claims could be mere psy-war to boost the morale of troops and at the same time damage that of the Islamists. But psy-war can rebound badly if there is no progress on the ground.

This begs the question why the Pakistanis are not going the whole hog against the Islamists. There are five plausible reasons for keeping the conflict lingering. The first is the India factor. In other words, the Pakistan army is using the bogey of its commitments on the eastern front to avoid moving more forcefully on the western front. And now, with US president-elect Barack Obama linking a resolution of Kashmir with the situation in Afghanistan, the India factor has acquired a new salience. Second, the Pakistanis see the continuing conflict as a cash cow.

The dollars will continue to flow Pakistan’s way as long as this conflict lasts. The trick is to keep it manageable so that it doesn’t acquire proportions that actually threaten the Pakistani state’s survival. Lending credence to this is the hubris in many top Pakistani military officials that the Taliban does not pose a significant challenge and can be bottled up as and when the decision to do so is taken. That this could be a serious miscalculation is not something that bothers the people who hold this view.

A third reason could be that the army does not want to eliminate the Taliban completely because they might be needed in Kashmir and Afghanistan as and when the Americans leave, something that the Pakistanis believe will happen in not too distant a future. Perhaps this is why the use of force is at present only aimed at demonstrating to the ‘irreconcilable’ elements among the Taliban the massive firepower that will be brought to bear if they don’t agree to function within the parameters set for them by the Army. The idea is not to allow the insurgents to capture any more territory, and at the same time not push it back completely. If in the process of a military stand-off, a substantial section of the militants can be made amenable to play the game by the army’s rules, then they can be used for fighting the dirty wars in Afghanistan and Kashmir.

The fourth reason could be that the Pakistan army no longer has the capacity, capability or commitment to comprehensively defeat the Taliban. The generals probably don’t want to exert themselves beyond a point to win back the areas they have lost to the insurgents because retaining control over regained territory is an immensely difficult and expensive proposition. The force levels required to maintain supply lines and re-establish the writ of the state in this inhospitable terrain are not going to be easy to garner for the Pakistani state.

Finally, there could be a real fear that large-scale military operations may worsen the situation rather than improve it. In case the militants fight the army to a stand-still or worse, defeat the army in a few engagements, it could precipitate a crisis of unmanageable proportions for the Pakistani state. The unavoidable collateral damage, civilian casualties, hundreds of thousands of internally displaced people, large scale destruction of homes and hearths, could unleash forces that could push the Pakistani state into failure. It is for this reason that the Pakistani authorities do not want to throw everything at the insurgents and want to keep open the option of a political settlement.

In all likelihood, all these reasons are playing a role in what outsiders see as Pakistan’s continuing double-game on the issue of fighting the Islamists. But in the process, Pakistan is unable to stop the haemorrhaging of the state.

Remembering: Mr Clean – V P Singh

By Neha Singh

VP Singh can be remembered as the champion of social justice.

Two abiding images of former prime minister V P Singh will survive his death. One is personal and the other is political. In personal conviction and conduct he was among the most incorruptible of politicians and acquired the name of Mr Clean, ironically because cleanliness was becoming a rare quality among politicians in the 1980s. His split with Rajiv Gandhi and parting of ways with the Congress came as a result of a conflict between this personal conviction and the party’s interests, as exemplified in the handling of the Bofors case.

It would be uncharitable to view his revolt as an opportunistic gambit for power and betrayal of the party because rectitude was an article of faith with him. If he acquired an additional sheen to his halo after the Congress expelled him, it was because the Bofors issue had struck a popular chord. He was only in tune with the times, and the rise in stature and the Prime Ministership that followed was only collateral.

The political persona of VP Singh is as the champion of social justice after he accepted the Mandal Commission report on reservations for backward classes. This act of social engineering may not have been devoid of political considerations but he changed the political discourse in the country forever. It would be unfair to dub politics as the only driving force of his move to find a new social equation for politics.

The empowerment of a marginalised class was only an extension of the idea of representative democracy. He sought a new social equilibrium for politics not just in terms of caste empowerment but on the basis of regional aspirations also. It was his tenure as Prime Minister that saw the emergence of regional parties as major forces in national politics. This was also part of the natural evolution of politics in the country and he was perceptive enough to feel the undercurrents.

VP Singh will be seen as one of the transformational figures of Indian politics, firmly rooted in an old world of values like secularism, and opening up a new world of different political values. It was perhaps his artistic imagination that helped him to integrate these worlds in himself.

Editorial: Pakistani hand?

By Sobia Khan

There are strong pointers to Pakistani involvement.

The commando operations to overpower the terrorists in Mumbai are almost over. The forces have succeeded in securing the two landmark hotels in the city and a residential building, though in the process a number of innocent people who were taken hostage by the terrorists have lost their lives. The anxiety of the last 48 hours has tested the nation. But considering the logistical difficulties of fighting an unconventional battle with motivated and trained terrorists, the long duration of the operation is understandable. There are blessings to be counted in terms of saved lives and minimisation of collateral damage, but the grief and sorrow inflicted by the terrorists cannot be measured. The human cost is huge and the loss suffered by many people cannot be compensated for. But it is also time to shift attention to the internal failures that made us to face the situation and to the suspected external circumstances that brought it about.

According to information given out by the security agencies and the political leadership, there are strong pointers to Pakistani involvement in the attack. The arrival of the terrorists in Mumbai by the sea, the choice of targets, the language they spoke while they were holed up in the hotels, the recovery of a satellite phone, and more importantly the identity of a captured terrorist who is said to belong to Multan in Pakistan, are factors that strengthen the suspicion. The Prime Minister had hinted this on Thursday and External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee has stated it in more definitive terms. The Prime Minister has already taken up the matter with the Pakistan government and Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) chief Ahmed Shuja Pasha is expected to visit India for a briefing on the matter. The Pakistan government cannot avoid responsibility if persons of Pakistani origin or organisations that operate there are behind the attack. The fact that Pakistan also has seen terrorist outrages is no mitigating factor. The ISI is not under the control of the civilian government in Islamabad, and assurances on curbing anti-India activity within Pakistan, given to India by successive leaders of that country, have not been kept.

The interrogation of captured terrorists and follow-up of the clues will lead to a clearer idea about the plot and those who executed it. If direct or indirect Pakistani involvement is confirmed, India will have to take steps to eliminate that possibility in future. Pakistan cannot dismiss India’s suspicions as the usual blame game and should co-operate with the investigation to get at the truth. Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi’s word on this is welcome.

Failure of Indian intelligence: The buck stops nowhere!

By M H Ahssan & John Wilson

The increasing failure of the intelligence agencies, both at the sate and the federal level, to prevent such attacks has emboldened the terrorists groups which have struck back, despite security measures…

Almost a dozen state police units and intelligence agencies were tracking down terrorist groups across India for the past two years but missed to detect the activities of the men who were involved in the Mumbai terror attack.

Though there were reports, based mainly on the interrogation of terrorists arrested in the recent past, about Mumbai being the next target, there were no specific leads about how the terrorists will strike.

The increasing failure of the intelligence agencies, both at the sate and the federal level, to prevent such attacks has emboldened the terrorists groups which have struck back, despite large scale arrests and security measures, at a frequency of two months in the recent past – Ahmedabad in July, Delhi in September and now Mumbai in November. These attacks were not carried out by the same group of terrorists but by a loose coalition of groups located in different parts of the country, activated and coordinated by a central command, likely to be outside India.

This singular inability is not caused by lack of information but a deep reluctance to share data and resources among the police and intelligence agencies and the pitfall of having a multiplicity of organisations, with separate command and control which, in essence, means the buck stops nowhere.

The most debilitating factor in the Indian intelligence war on terrorism has been the reluctance, and even refusal, to share information among the intelligence and security agencies. Along with an inept information-sharing architecture at the national level, this reluctance has proved to be the most critical flaw in counter-terrorism intelligence operations.

The problem came to the fore early this year when police in the Karnataka state of southern India arrested one Riyazuddin Nasir on charges of vehicle theft. Nasir would have been let out on bail for these minor charges but for a single intelligence official in New Delhi who decided to search the database for connections with terrorist activities. Nasir was found to be a Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami’s (HuJI) operative and one of India’s most wanted men.

It is not really difficult to see where the problem is: an intelligence structure which has yet to emerge from its debilitating colonial legacy and a complementary stranglehold of bureaucracy. The structure and operational philosophy of state police and intelligence units have not changed much since British days. They are mostly structured as agencies to protect law and order and spy on rivals rather than act as investigative and intelligence units. Criminal investigators are usually inserted into terrorism investigations only after an incident takes place. There are no independent anti-terror units carrying out both intelligence and investigations into terrorist groups at the state level.

At the top of the intelligence pyramid is the National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS), headed by an all-powerful, politically-appointed National Security Advisor (NSA), who often has much more than terrorism on his mind. Intelligence operations within the country are carried out by the Intelligence Bureau (IB) and its wide network of officers and men, all reporting to the Ministry of Home Affairs.

The ministry is headed by a cabinet minister and one or two ministers of state – besides a secretary and other senior officials – who often get tempted, at least close to the elections, to utilize the IB for assessing the electoral chances of their party while spying on their rivals. The IB is grossly under-staffed and the field operatives, numbering 3000, and analysts need to be updated on skills urgently.

External intelligence is the responsibility of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), working directly under the cabinet secretary but reporting to the NSA for all practical purposes. The RAW keeps a sharp eye on the activities of terrorist groups with bases in foreign countries. According to former IB joint director Maloy Krishna Dhar, RAW’s reluctance to share information with the IB is legendary. There have also been instances where personality clashes have deterred effective coordination between the NSA and RAW chiefs. The RAW, for the moment, is riven with dissensions in the top rung and afflicted by unsavoury mud-slinging between various officers which have seriously affected its capability.

The second set of intelligence agencies are the military ones, led by the Directorate General of Military Intelligence (DGMI) with a network of field offices and forward posts in the border areas as well as representatives in diplomatic missions. Since the DGMI has been historically part of the army, the air force and navy have individual intelligence units collecting and collating information relevant to their operations and bases. The Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA), created in 2002 to correct this anomaly, is entrusted with the task of coordinating the whole spectrum of military intelligence but is presently short-staffed, poorly funded and burdened with an ambitious and expanding circle of objectives.

Paramilitary organisations like the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and Border Security Force (BSF) maintain their own intelligence units to support counter-insurgency operations in Kashmir and elsewhere. Their intelligence operations have often been stymied by the army’s reluctance to share intelligence tapped from its wide network of informers and sources. Other government agencies providing physical security, like the Special Protection Group (SPG), Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) and National Security Guards (NSG), all maintain their own intelligence units.

At the bottom of the pyramid are the state police, whose intelligence networks remain the primary source of information and main agency for implementing action on the ground. The most critical element in this structure is the investigative branch of the local police forces. These go by various names, such as the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), the Special Branch or the Crime Branch. There is no uniformity in responsibilities or operational duties. Typically, these units carry out the investigation and prosecution of terrorist, and arms and counterfeit cases, placing them in the unique position of being able to detect the emergence of terror networks or coalitions.

Unfortunately, they remain the weakest link in the intelligence chain as these units carry the burden of acting as colonial-style law enforcement agencies and not as modern units capable of organising preventive measures based on intelligence collection. These forces are commonly afflicted with poor morale and problems related to accountability, pay and training. Even in metropolitan centres like New Delhi and Mumbai, the police-criminal nexus and pervasive corruption have rendered effective intelligence from federal agencies worthless.

There was clear intelligence available about terrorist attacks in Mumbai at least a month before the July 2006 commuter train blasts. This intelligence was not followed up on, nor were preventive measures put in place at railway stations. A week after the Mumbai bombings, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was quoted by the media as saying that “past responses have been inadequate in dealing with these problems which are of a different intensity, magnitude, scale and scope”.

Of the several steps taken in recent years to overcome these outstanding difficulties, two held great promise. One was the creation of the National Technical Research Organization (NTRO), with a focus on collecting technical intelligence (TECHINT), cyber intelligence and cyber counter-intelligence. Beginning with RAW’s Aviation Research Centre (ARC) assets, NTRO is rapidly expanding and strengthening its intelligence capabilities to fulfil this mandate.

On the other hand, the NTRO mandate adds one more agency to the mix, as the IB, RAW and the Indian Army’s Signals Directorate will continue to maintain autonomous TECHINT units.

The second step was the establishment of a Multi-Agency Centre (MAC) and a Joint Task Force on intelligence within IB as a hub of India’s counter-terrorism effort. The mission objective was to run an umbrella organization comprising state-level units called SMACs and the development of a national counter-terrorism database supported by state-level police-intelligence Joint Task Forces and inter-state Intelligence Support Teams. Conceived after the pattern of the US Central Investigative Agency’s (CIA)Counter-Terrorism Center, the MAC was to be responsible for the joint analysis of intelligence flowing from different quarters and coordinating relevant follow-up actions.

Five years after MAC was approved, it is today composed of a skeletal staff and five SMACs, using a database hosted on a bare-bones computer system designed in-house, with no real-time links to state police forces or other intelligence agencies. There is no sign of the development of the comprehensive database on terrorists on which the entire counter-terrorism information grid was to be built. Senior intelligence officials have pointed out that the interrogation reports of 16,000 Islamist terrorists caught between 1991 and 2005 could prove to be a gold mine of actionable intelligence.

These inadequacies can be overcome by beefing up the present staff strength and widening the recruitment base to include the qualified technical personnel needed to develop, integrate and man the information grid. But progress is delayed due to unseemly bureaucratic wrangling over funding for an additional 140 positions at MAC. Added to this problem is the army’s refusal to depute officials to the agency, citing disciplinary and administrative problems.

Difficulties like these and the tepid response of the state governments to a 2007 Supreme Court directive ordering improvements in the functioning of police and intelligence agencies continue to bedevil India’s attempts to fashion an effective counter-terrorism strategy. Meanwhile, terrorist groups continue to display a marked advantage in adapting to newer technologies and modes of operation, allowing them to function more quickly and quietly than the Indian intelligence community.

U S AUTOMOBILE INDUSTRY – The Jurassic auto and idea park

By M H Ahssan

The U.S. auto giants are an example of how things work in the age of unbridled corporate power. Of how the collapse of restraint on that power fractures economy and society.

It is unfair to call the United States auto industry dinosaurs, as some now do. It is certainly unfair to the dinosaurs. The ‘Terrible Lizards’ did not lay the basis for their own extinction or that of myriad other species. The U.S. automobile companies did – and will take large numbers of jobs, workers and businesses with them.

It is more like the asteroid hit on the earth which is presumed to have fried the dinosaurs. But that’s unfair to the asteroid. The U.S. auto giants General Motors, Ford and Chrysler are more a fine example of how things work in the age of unbridled corporate power. Of how the collapse of restraint on that power must fracture economy and society. They also set the very standards that the Indian elite lusts to emulate.

Metal lizards
The original dinosaurs (which scientists now tell us were neither all that terrible nor lizards) were great examples of success and adaptation. Good enough to rule the planet for 150 million years. The U.S. auto industry is the opposite. It’s not just that the Terrible Metal Lizards opposed fuel efficiency standards. Of course, they did. They also promoted gas-guzzling SUVs as a lifestyle must. They cranked out cars many did not want to buy. They wielded heavy clout in Congress. And were able to sponge off public funds in the name of saving jobs as they have yet again. Having received $25 billion earlier, their hats are in their outstretched hands again.

But that’s the easy part. There’s a lot more they did, as a major sector of industry – and as part of the larger corporate world of the U.S. Over decades, they destroyed both existing and potential public transport. The ‘American Dream’ so far as the automobile went was an imposed nightmare. In Detroit itself, you can see the skeletons of a once alive transport system. All across the country, for decades from the 1920s, they bought up public transport systems and shut them down. Trains were shifted from electric to diesel engines. Sometimes, they were simply done away with and replaced by buses and then cars. Together with Big Oil, Big Auto converted electric transit systems to fuel-based bus systems. In one estimate: In 1935, electric train engines outnumbered diesel train engines 7 to 1. “By 1970, diesel train engines outnumbered electric ones 100 to 1. And GM made 60 per cent of the diesel locomotives.” The electric rail system in and around Los Angeles was almost erased.

Fostering the cult
Fostering the cult of the individual-owned automobile was a major goal. By 2001, that goal was achieved beyond belief. Some 90 per cent of Americans drove to work by that year. The findings of the 2001 National Household Travel Survey are striking. Only 8 per cent households reported not having a vehicle available for regular use. The survey showed that “daily travel in the United States totalled about 4 trillion miles, which works out to an average of 14,500 miles per person over a full year.” Trips by transit and by school bus each made up just 2 per cent of daily trips taken in 2001.

Not just a cult but a culture grew around the Metal Lizards and fossil fuels. Even an economy that goes to war to deal with perceived threats to oil. (As Robert Fisk often asks: would there have been a war in Iraq if Iraq’s national product had been asparagus?) Again together with Big Oil, Big Auto for decades crushed all serious moves towards cleaner energy sources.

Almost everything grew dependent on it. From agriculture to aviation, individual to national needs. When oil prices rose (before their present crash) thanks to heavy speculation, countless households in the U.S. were paralysed. Hundreds of little family trucking businesses went kaput. People in outlying places who drive many miles to fetch things like bottled water and provisions found their budgets burning. An average American family in 2004 spent up to a fifth of its income on transportation. That’s against 13 per cent on food. In “automobile dependent neighbourhoods,” according to the Bureau of Labour Statistics, that could go up to 25 per cent. In bigger cities, the traffic only gets worse, never better. There were over 135 million passenger cars in 2006. Overall, registered vehicles clocked in at more than 250 million.

Imagine the centrality of oil, autos and private vehicles to just about everything. This is the very model our own Indian elite seeks to transplant. Private automobiles at the cost of public transport. Never mind the latter is a lot cleaner and creates large numbers of jobs. And so we add thousands of such vehicles to the roads each week.

But back to the Metal Dinosaurs of Detroit. Their asteroid hit will impact on far more than the nearly quarter of a million workers directly stranded on their turf. There are also more than a million retirees and dependents in trouble. The retirees now watch their health benefits vanish. That’s not nice in a country where health costs are the largest single cause of bankruptcies. At age 75 or 80, it is misery. Then there are millions of other workers in associated sectors. In part-makers, supplier companies, in dealerships.

The health issue is also vital. With all its wealth, the U.S. has no decent public health system. The corporate world as a whole has never allowed that to emerge. The health insurance mob, Big Pharma, huge corporations in the medical field, and so on. Take the loss of jobs in the automobile sector to Canada. One reason is simply because Canada has a much better public health system. Even GM (which also exists there) has lobbied in the past in that country to see that Canada’s universal health plan was not scuttled! It has saved GM countless dollars.

Each car that GM puts out carries a healthcare cost of around $1600. For Chrysler, that’s $1500. But for Toyota, that cost is under $300 per car. Japan has a far superior public health system. In the corporate-media of the U.S., this does not lead to calls for a good health system. Or for making health access cheaper. It leads to calls for doing away with the union contracts that guaranteed auto workers health benefits for life. For retirees, the pullback has already begun.

India even now has one of the most highly privatised health sectors in the world. Yet it exults in emulating the worst of the U.S. model. The Indian elite boasts of India as one of the hottest destinations in ‘medical tourism.’ Sure, Americans might fly to India to get their surgeries done (which would cost them an arm and a leg in their own country). But close to 200 million Indians have given up seeking any kind of medical attention at all – simply because they cannot afford it.

‘Too big to fail’
Meanwhile, the logic of “too big to fail” keeps Big Auto and others of its ilk going. There is never any debate in the U.S. on whether they should have been allowed to get as big as they did. President-elect Barack Obama says he will aid the auto oligarchs who he calls “the backbone of American manufacturing.” Sure, with that many jobs at stake, any government must worry about the consequences of letting them sink. No question about it. It’s on the basis of that very fear that the Terrible Metal Lizards are able to bargain for handouts from public money. This economy has lost close to a quarter of a million jobs in the month of October alone. So the thought of many more simply vanishing is scary. The U.S. has already lost over 1.2 million jobs this year. Close to half of those in the past three months alone.

So there is a good chance that more public money will be thrown at the auto giants. And that, without larger strategic shifts being imposed on them. Yet, everyone knows this does not mean an industry saved. They could be back soon with demands for still more. At which time, with things being even worse (quite likely) the pressure to save jobs by pouring in public money will be still greater. This is the United States.

The money given out in the bailout so far has delighted the Tuxedo dinosaurs – CEOs and senior executives. As The New York Times notes ruefully in a lead editorial: “Just weeks after the Treasury Department gave nine of the nation’s top banks $125 billion in taxpayer dollars to save them from unprecedented calamity, bank executives are salting money away in billionaire bonus pools to reward themselves for their performance.” Other bailout bandits have held meetings at resorts costing hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Remember the ‘debate’ over CEO compensation in India? The media shouted down their favourite Prime Minister when he made a few meek sounds of protest over inflated CEO pay. Well, there too, we were and are on the very track that has helped the U.S. land itself in the mess it now is in. Welcome to the Jurassic Auto & Idea Park.

OPINION: POLITICIANS – Who fits the bill?

By M H Ahssan Editor in Chief – Hyderabad News Network

Are there, can there be, Obama-like figures in Indian politics? HNN says Indian political history certainly includes one such person, and one of the modern netas too might be of similar mould.

In the days following the American presidential elections, a number of television channels ran programmes asking variants of these questions. What does the victory of Barack Obama mean for the present and future of Indian democracy? What lessons can Indians draw from his campaign for inclusiveness? Are there, can there be, Obama-like figures in Indian politics?

Journalists must necessarily focus on the present and future, but as a historian, I am allowed to look at the past. The phenomenon of Barack Obama was, to some degree, anticipated in the similar rise from disadvantage and obscurity of B.R. Ambedkar. If anything, the Indian’s story is even more compelling.

As systems of social discrimination, caste and race are comparable. But if Obama is at least half-white, Ambedkar was 100 per cent Dalit. Both, intriguingly, were products of that great, metropolitan university, Columbia in New York – the American taking an undergraduate degree there, the Indian a rather more elevated PhD. Obama went on to take a law degree from Harvard; long before him, Ambedkar had already qualified for the London bar, and was to obtain a second doctoral degree from the London School of Economics, which, in purely academic terms, was something like the Harvard of those times.

Ambedkar was born in a Dalit, working-class household. His father had a small job in the army, and there was no history of education in the family. Obama’s father at least had a college degree, and his mother was white. Both Obama and Ambedkar were, in their birth and social origins, anything but men of privilege – but Ambedkar was even more underprivileged. Like his American successor, the great Indian jurist made his mark by dint of exceptional courage and a still more exceptional intelligence. Like Obama, he owed his degrees, from the best universities in the world, to his brilliance and hard work alone.

Like Obama, for his persistence and his achievements, Ambedkar did, in the end and after much struggle, get his rewards. Before Independence, he was a member of the highest decision-making body in British India – the viceroy’s executive council. After Independence, he became law minister in the first cabinet of free India. If we consider that slavery existed in the United States of America for a bare 200 years, while caste has existed in India for two millennia and more, then the fact that a Dalit supervised the drafting of the Indian Constitution must be reckoned to be as significant, as boundary-breaching, as earth-shattering a historical event as that of a half-black man becoming the president of the United States of America. And let us remind ourselves that the Indian, and India, took precedence in this regard – for Ambedkar became law minister sixty years before Obama became president.

The man who chose and ran that first Union cabinet of free India also, in some degree, anticipated the later career of Obama. The parallels in this case are not those of social class or academic achievement, but rather of political style. Throughout his campaign, Obama has practised a non-sectarian politics – he reached out to whites as well as blacks, to the middle-class as well as to the poor, to gays as well as straights, to long-time Democrats as well as seriously uncommitted voters. Long before him, Jawaharlal Nehru had also reached out to Indians of different religions, genders, classes, and linguistic groups.

A casual comparison (pending a more systematic one) of the speeches made by Nehru in the first Indian general elections of 1952 with the speeches made by Obama more recently would bear this out. Nehru won those elections for the Congress because he spoke as a Hindu who was trusted by Muslims, a socialist who was yet admired by the capitalist class, a man who was adored by women, a Hindi-speaker who was respected by South Indians and Oriyas and even, on occasion, by Bengalis.

The US in 2008 is in a state of crisis – caught up in two wars of its own making, in the early stages of what looks like a prolonged economic recession. To tackle these problems, the president-elect has sensibly chosen a non-partisan approach. In his acceptance speech in Chicago, he told those who had not voted for him that he heard their voices and would be their president too. It is overwhelmingly likely that important jobs in his administration shall go to those who are not members of the Democratic Party, even to Republicans. For, as Obama has recognized, desperate times call not for desperate, but for cool, considered, that it to say statesman-like, measures.

India in 1948 was in an even greater state of crisis. There were shortages of food and foreign exchange. On the right, Hindu fundamentalists, having tasted the blood of the Mahatma, were mobilizing for countrywide action; on the left, having been so ordered by their Soviet bosses, the Communist Party of India had launched an armed insurrection. The Right had to be tamed, the Left conquered – and there was more, much more, to do. Eight million refugees had to be resettled, 500 princely states to be integrated. A federal Constitution that would preserve the unity of India and yet respect the rights and aspirations of the states had to be discussed and designed. Apart from healing the wounds within, India had also to decide how best to position itself in the emerging world-order, how to cultivate friendships with the two superpowers without becoming subservient to either.

Like Obama, Nehru knew that in this task of national renewal he had to call upon people outside of his own party. Thus, some Congressmen were made to vacate their (hard-won) seats in the Constituent Assembly so that qualified jurists (Ambedkar among them, but also such non-partisan legal brains as Alladi Krishnaswamy Aiyar) could be formally associated with the drafting of the Constitution. In the Union cabinet itself, Congressmen served alongside S. P. Mookerjee, Baldev Singh and Shanmugham Chetty, men who in pre-Independence days had worked in opposition to (and often abused) them.

Enough of nostalgia, I will be told. Forget the past – who now, in present-day India, is the politician who is not wholly unremoved from the style and strategies of the remarkable Barack Obama? Here again, there is an unacknowledged precursor, if at first glance a somewhat unlikely and unprepossessing one. Nitish Kumar has no Harvard degree (perhaps no degree at all). He dresses in a crumpled kurta, not a well-pressed suit. He is an indifferent orator. Still, he too speaks of, and in some measure, practises, a politics that is non-sectarian. When the National Democratic Alliance said that it would project the “Gujarat model of development” to the whole country, Kumar asked them instead to showcase the Bihar model of development, since it was “inclusive”. (The last word, as used by the Bihar chief minister, was an euphemism for “not anti-Muslim”.)

India is a more diverse country than the US. It is run on a parliamentary rather than a presidential system. The states have more autonomy in their functioning. It may thus be that the quest for an ‘Indian Obama’ is futile, since there cannot, and need not, be one. Rather than searching for a single, brilliant, charismatic leader who can reshape the country, we would be better served by a dozen, lesser (and less glamorous) figures who are, in some degree, Obama-like.

In so far as he is not sectarian, does not come from a political dynasty, appears to be honest and committed to good governance for all – not just a particular caste or religious grouping – Nitish Kumar may be considered to fit the bill. He is no Barack Obama, but he is certainly much less unlike Obama than, say, Mayavati or Rahul Gandhi or Narendra Modi. An India of 15 or 20 chief ministers in his mould would be a better, or least a less unhappy and less violent, place.

Aaj ke Aurangzeb – Our Politicians!

By Renuka Narayanan

The Guru Granth Sahib contains hymns by Hindu and Muslim saints along with those of the Sikh Gurus. It is inclusive, not divisive. The Gurus, from Guru Nanak (1469-1539), through Gurus Angad, Amardas, Ramdas, Arjun, Hargobind, Har Rai, Har Kishan, Tegh Bahadur to Gobind Singh, each brought something to the evolution of this unifying concept. It was Guru Arjun (1563-1606) who compiled the Adi Granth in 1601-4 and installed it at the Harmandir Sahib in Amritsar. It’s always worth recalling that it was the Sufi, Mian Mir, whom the Guru invited to lay the foundation stone.

Guru Tegh Bahadur lived a retired life at Bakala village on the banks of the Beas and was known as “Bakala Baba’ before Kashmiri Pandits pleaded with him to save religious freedom in India and he sacrificed himself to death-by-Aurangzeb. But there is an important point here: Aurangzeb was a bad ruler who tormented his people and alienated their affection by his intolerant behaviour. He was hated, moreover, for having killed his popular elder brother Dara Shikoh, the rightful king. So Aurangzeb cannot be classified as “Muslim’ in the spiritual sense, only in the political sense: a political bigot who applied Qur’anic surahs literally, not liberally. In sum, Aurangzeb, the last Great Mughal, manifestly failed in his dharma as a son, a brother and a king. (Why do you think Lord Ram is upheld as a political counter-symbol today?).

Do some Muslims in the sub-continent indeed celebrate Aurangzeb as a ‘good Muslim’ because he persecuted Hindus? It is an interesting thought, bound to reap its own consequences. However in the interests of co-existence it is important for every Indian to see Aurangzeb for what he was – a political failure – and not take him personally.

It was righteous wrath at the murder of his father that made Guru Gobind (1666-1708) militarize the Sikhs. He composed a Persian couplet to justify it: “Chunkaar az huma heeltey dar gujasht/Haal ast burdenay ba shamshir e dast’: ‘When there is intolerable oppression in the land, it is right and fitting to pick up the sword.’

We must remember though that the Guru fought against an absolute monarch. The rules are different in a democracy. ‘The Hindus’ made their grand gesture against 1192, 1526, etc by shooting an unarmed old man on January 30, 1948. We made the laws ourselves after Independence.

That is why Babri Masjid, Kashmiri Pandit refugees, Gujarat riots, Kandhamal and anti-Hinduism pamphlets/speeches are ALL equally unacceptable. Every community seems guilty of something. Nail and punish spoilers of the peace, starting with today’s Aurangzebs, our politicians.

Our terrorising political failure

By M H Ahssan

Intense, abject fear or dread. High-value political coin used for playing the blame game.

It took a clustered shoot-’em-up attack to put a stop to the ongoing season of terror politics — for almost 24 hours. The terrorists who took over South Mumbai on Wednesday night were as well-trained, well-equipped and logistically supported as any commando raiding party. The murderous audacity of the assault and the magnitude of the toll were so shocking that we were very happy to let the specialists in uniform deal with the situation without political interference. But it couldn’t last. Because in India, terror has been devalued and shorn of its dreadful enormity by the political class. Now, it’s just politics by other means.

Through Thursday, the President, the Prime Minister and Opposition leader L.K. Advani issued politically neutral statements. But late in the evening, Advani and Jaswant Singh found themselves drawn to the TV lights at Nariman Point like moths to a flame. And amidst the pious talk about how we should all pull together as a team, setting aside communal sentiment, they popped the f-word: intelligence failure — implying government failure. Any leader out of power can hammer the government with it while clamouring for tough terror laws, though neither really pre-empts attacks. The term has become so trite by overuse that we should look beyond it to see why terror continues unabated. It’s not because of intelligence failure or the lack of legal deterrence, but because of political failure.

Terror prospers because the security agencies are constantly distracted by political diversions. In Mumbai, for instance, they have been grappling with Marathi manoos-hood intent on breaking the heads of migrant Biharis. The precious person of the politician is itself a diversion — the appearance of Advani and Jaswant Singh at Nariman Point distracted the attention of securitymen from an ongoing operation. Even when the agencies are allowed to do their job, they are trammelled by political interference. The insurgency in Assam was never completely extinguished because Army operations were repeatedly pulled back when they were on the brink of success. Today, Advani’s offer to join hands with the government would have carried some weight, were it not for the fact that he has made terror suspect Pragya Singh Thakur the BJP mascot in the Madhya Pradesh elections.

Terror sells in the electoral marketplace. It is valuable coin for any political formation which benefits from public insecurity, whose electoral promise is to make your life safer. Which is why we should take policymaking on terror out of the absolute control of the political puppet masters and allow a meaningful say to the specialists — the men in uniform who put their lives on the line in Mumbai this week.

Mumbai falls prey to rumours

By Alex D’souza

Along with the terror attacks, city residents are also battling paranoia, panic and rumours. Sounds – ostensibly of gunfire – caused panic at CST station and train services were terminated for half-an-hour on Friday afternoon. While some sources said a policeman mistakenly fired his weapon at Azad Maidan, others said that an indicator had crashed at the station.

BMC sources said the railway control room informed the civic office that three terrorists were in the station and firing. The BMC was told that CST’s exits had been shut. When journalists called up the BMC control room, the latter only confirmed the ‘developments’, until they were found to be untrue.

However, by then several major TV channels reported the “news” and then retracted it after finding out it was untrue. But by the time news anchors apologised for stoking panic, many nervous Mumbaikars were already heading home.

Mumbai resident Miku Mathew was on a Central Railway train bound for CST when she got a panicked call from her sister in Pune at about 1.15pm. “My sister was frantic. She said several TV channels were reporting renewed firing at CST and urged me to return home right away,” said Mathew. As if on cue, her train chose to stop that moment between the Chinchpokhli and Byculla stations. Mathew said, “The train remained stuck for a good 15 minutes. Many women in the coach, who had received similar phone calls, jumped off. Soon, hundreds of men and women, including senior citizens, were trudging along the tracks to Chinchpokhli. Some scaled the railway boundary walls to take the road. I called my colleagues at CST, who assured me it was all just a rumour. A friend also SMSed to say Doordarshan had clarified there was no firing. My train moved on, and I found things were normal at CST.”

Services resumed at 1.40pm and the main concourse of the station was evacuated. Divisional railway manager, Central Railway, J N Lal, who rushed to the site, said the control room received a call which said that firing was heard from the station.

“I was in the control room when the call came in. The caller sounded panicky and said he heard two shots. CST is an important station and handles 36 lakh passengers everyday,” he said.

At Charni Road station on the Western line, passengers started returning home after hearing that trains were not running beyond Mumbai Central. Railway announcements rubbished the rumour, but many offices closed for the day. At about 4.30pm on Friday, rumours flew of gunfire at Marine Lines station, also on the Western line. These, too, were unfounded.

Rumours also led to the police blockading in the afternoon the road between Metro junction and Crawford market, on which the police commissionerate is located.

Sukrat, who was taking flying lessons in Mumbai, has fled to his hometown Shirdi after news of the attacks. “I heard a couple of terrorists are roaming free. I opted to be safe,” said Sukrat. Echoing his views, Vishal Nirbhavane told TOI over the phone from Nashik, “My whole day was spent listening to rumours of fresh attacks. I would not have felt safe unless I was home.”

Mumbai terror attacks: Nation salutes martyrs

By M H Ahssan & Alex D’souza

The body of Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) chief Hemant Karkare, who was killed while leading from the front in the battle against terrorists attack in Mumbai was on Saturday brought to his home at Shivaji Park in central Mumbai ahead of the funeral.

The cremation was delayed so that his two daughters who live abroad could return in time for the last rites. While his elder daughter Jui is married and lives in the US, the younger Sayali is studying in London. His son Akash is based in Mumbai.

As terrorists Wednesday night targeted 10 Mumbai landmarks, Karkare donned his helmet and bullet-proof jacket and set out to take them on. The protection, however, proved inadequate and Karkare fell to the terrorists’ bullets. In all, 148 people were killed in the attacks and 327 were injured.

The 58-year-old Karkare, a 1982 batch Indian Police Service (IPS) officer, was in the spotlight for leading investigation into the Sep 29 blasts in Maharashtra’s Malegaon town. Ten people, including Sadhvi Pragnya Thakur and Lt Col Prasad Purohit, were arrested as a result of the probe.

Karkare had taken over the ATS in January after a seven-year stint with India’s external intelligence agency Research Analysis Wing (RAW).

Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan
Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, 31, was martyred while engaging terrorists on Friday at the Taj hotel. He was with the 51 Special Action Group of the force and was with the NSG on deputation. He has been with the Black Cat commando force for the last two years.

An officer of the Bihar Regiment, he was commissioned in the Indian Army in 1999. The officer had joined the NSG on deputation in January 2007 after having served two tenures with his battalion in counter insurgency and counter terrorism roles. The officer hails from Bangalore where his father works for the Indian Space Research Organisation.

The funeral of the NSG Commando officer Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, who laid down his life battling the terrorists in the Mumbai attacks, will be held with military honours.

Major Unnikrishnan body was brought to his house at ISRO layout in the outskirts of the Bangalore, where arrangements had been made for family, friends and well wishers to have a last glimpse of the Mumbai anti-terror hero.

NSG hawaldar: Gajendra Singh
The body of NSG hawaldar Gajendra Singh, who died fighting terrorists in Mumbai’s Nariman House, was today brought to Delhi before being taken to his native place Dehradun for the last rites.

All ranks and file of the elite force gathered at NSG headquarters in Palam to pay their tributes to the slain hawaldar.

The body of Singh, who was a member of NSG’s 51 Special Action Group, will be later taken to Dehradun, an NSG spokesperson said.

Mumbai a target for terrorists

By Golden Reejsinghani

Terrorists are like black shadows that stealthily come in the night and do their work. Mumbai is known as a safe city and the people living in this city always thought Afghanistan, Kashmir and Pakistan were soft targets for terrorists. But now Mumbai is also under their fire. Terrorists ran amuck on the streets of Mumbai spraying bullets and lobbying grenades on innocent people without making the concession for the old , infirm , women , children and sick people their main aim was to destroy the very fabric of Mumbai and to kill the spirit of the cosmopolitan nature for which it is famous.

In 1993 the first bomb blast ripped the city apart. But the denizens of Mumbai rose up like a proverbial phoenix from the ashes and rebuilt the city and this continued till today but this did not go down well with the terrorist and therefore they tried many more times to bring Bombay and its people to their knees. Some of the terrorist attacks which followed the 1993 carnage are given below.

August 28 , 1997 – Bomb blasts took place near Jama Masjid injuring 3 people
January 24,1998- Malad 1 person got injured
February 27, 2008 – Virar – 9 people got injured.
December 2, 2002 – Blast in BEST Bus at Ghatkopar.
December 6, 2002 – Mumbai Central Railway station 25 people got injured.
January 27, 2003 – Vile Parle killing 1 and injuring at least 25.
March 13 , 2003 – Mulund Railway station killing 11 and injuring 80
August 25, 2003 – Two taxis were ripped apart in the morning in Mumbai.
July 11, 2006 – Serial Blasts took place at 7 places in the evening killing 225 and injuring 890 innocent citizens.
July 29, 2003 – Ghatkopar killing 3 and injuring 34 people.

This time around the terrorists wanted to really kill the spirit of the city and aim at destroying the pride of Mumbai when inconceivable terror and over whelming feeling of fear and anxiety returned to Mumbai’s Streets on Wednesday night killing more than 25 people and injuring at least 327 people including the ATS chief Mr. Hemant Karkare, additional commissioner Ashok Kamte and the encounter specialist Mr. Vijay Salaskr. All these top notch officials laid their life for the love of the country fighting bravely with the terrorists. .

The main aim of these terrorists was to bring a dead end to the country’s commercial center Mumbai .The terrorists who attacked Mumbai moved about in groups of two’s and three’s and attacked the innocent people on the roads all over the city, setting off inter connected numerous blasts and gunshot in many localities across the city including the CST train station and two posh five star hotels – Oberoi trident and the Taj Mahal Hotel. These two hotels are pride of Mumbai , especially the Taj Mhal hotel which is known as a heritage hotel and every tourist envy, the terrorist tried their best to d0 9/11 to the hotels like they did to twin towers in USA and most recently to Marriott hotel in Pakistan, but in spite of their best efforts the two hotels took all the beating right on their bellies and stood like two sentinels looking them squarely in the eye and challenging them to destroy them, today the terrorists are all smoked out of the hotels and their dead bodies removed to the morgue except for one Azam Amir Kassam a 21 year old who is from Faridkot which is in Pakistan, he is the only one who is captured alive and who is spilling the beans on his comrades.

The terrorists arrived in the city through the sea route with hand grenades, Automatic machine guns and a large amount of explosives. The terrorists did not even refrain from harming hospitals like the GT and the Cama hospital.

Eye witness Santosh singh said,‘Hand grenades, automatic machine guns and rifles were used by the terrorists to spread unimaginable terror and kill the innocent people. Unfortunately Non –resident Indians and the policemen were the major targets of these people”

Eye witnesses recounting Tales of Horror

TAJ: Many were the people who were trapped inside the two prestigious hotels, according to one eye witness Jaisingh Giakwad Patel, NCP MP from Beed said “he was staying in room 319 in Taj hotel and he saw that the terrorists were well equipped. Around 9.45 p.m. “I was watching TV when I heard gunfire I thought these must be fire crackers, but when this continued for sometime I called up the reception and I was told not to open the door because the hotel was under siege from terrorists. whole night the firing continued and the sound of grenades shattered the silence of the night, the terrorists forcibly opened the doors of foreign nationals and they were taken hostages the terrorists positioned themselves in strategic locations around the hotel and anyone who dared to peep out of their room was shot down in cold blood. All this time I had nothing to eat I survived on 3 fruits, a few bottles of cold drinks and water till I was rescued by NSG commandos 2.30”.

CHATRAPATI SHIVAJI TERMINUS TRAIN STATION: Ramakrishna Athyale who has a pan shop went to the CST station to catch a train at 9.10 p.m. when he had just boarded the train he heard the gun shots. In a second of minutes People were running all over the station.

VILE PARLE: Ram Prasad Singh was on the road in his car when the taxi near the fly over exploded “I was 500 meters away from the place where the taxi exploded and everything was surrounded in smoke and the vehicle that contained the bomb blew into bits and pieces.”

COLABA: “I and my friends were eating outside at a road side stall when we heard gunshots and all the people were running helter skelter this occurred around 9.55 p.m At that moment I and my friends could not think of anything but run”. – Ramprasad Sanghvi executive.

WADI BUNDER: Amina Sheikh was an eye witness to the blast that took place near the BPT Colony at wadi bunder near the sandhurst road , recounts that “ it was a very scary situation to face when I saw many dead and blown away to pieces when the bomb exploded in a taxi stationed outside the hutments colony”.

It is bewildering to see how innocent citizens are being wiped out by the terrorists. And disgusting to see these terrorists killing people at will There must be some solution to this nagging problem-to clear terrorists from the city it took 52 hours of hard work and back breaking labor along with this there were many who lost their lives, many who are permentaly maimed, many who have lost their jobs in these days of recessions. Who is going to give these people back their loved ones, their jobs and what about the trauma, people who have seen the carnage at close quarters will carry this trauma throughout their lives, there must be some solution to the problem and this can be solved only if all the governments of the world get together and start a fight against terrorists and countries harboring these terrorist the attacks are becoming very frequent every country in the world is being targeted by these dark forces because they feel invincible-somebody has to make them realize that they are not invincible and the start should be made by India because it has seen the worst attack of terrorism in this century. India needs to establish a national terrorist law and its approach in dealing with the terrorists should be even handed. There is an urgent need to damp down the temperature in the country and along the lines of L.O.C. India also needs a united policy direction at the national level to deal with terrorism.

BJP’s Sarah Palin – Vijay Kumar Melhotra

By Neha Kapoor

We may not have found our Obama yet, but it looks like we’ve got a Sarah Palin equivalent all right. Rewind to the finger pointing that went on in the Republican camp as the McCain campaign stuttered in the final weeks of the US presidential poll. Palin couldn’t do anything right. She was painted as the ultimate wrong woman in the wrong place at the wrong time. The BJP in Delhi is going down the same road. Find a sucker and blame him for your problems. The BJP’s Sarah Palin is its chief ministerial candidate for Delhi, Vijay Kumar Malhotra. He’s become the butt of ridicule and criticism in party circles as the going gets tough in an election the BJP should have won with ease. Like Sarah Palin, Malhotra just can’t seem to get it right. Every time he opens his mouth, he puts his foot in it. He’s the male counterpart of the Palin airhead, minus her glamour.

Malhotra has created so many Palin moments for the BJP that the party has now put a gag order on him. Television debates were the first casualty. He has been forbidden from participating in them after his silver-tongued Congress opponent, sitting chief minister Sheila Dikshit, made mincemeat of him in the first two. If US-style presidential television debates could decide the outcome of our elections, Dikshit would have won hands down. Malhotra’s excuse for his no-show at the third debate was a sore throat. He told some journalists that he’s had to start daily gargles to keep his throat in working order for his campaign speeches.

The second casualty was the series of public meetings that Malhotra was to address in different parts of Delhi. The party had planned to showcase its future chief minister through these rallies. Instead, he’s been told to stay put in his assembly constituency of Greater Kailash and not venture out. These days, Malhotra can be found at ladies’kirtans and small friendly gatherings where he can speak without fear of censure.

Fortunately for him, the Congress has nominated a virtual unknown to contest against him. Jitendra Kochchar was third on the Congress suggested list for Greater Kailash but he managed to streak ahead of the other two to bag the ticket. They say that Malhotra struck a deal with Congress power brokers to give him a smooth ride by putting up a “weak” candidate. Politics is all about mutual accommodation, even with the opposition. With the BJP going through major anxiety pangs over Malhotra, one wonders what’s in store for the man if the party fails to pull off a victory in Delhi. Perhaps it should have chosen an Obama instead of settling for a Palin.

TAILPIECE
Elections have become so difficult to predict that politicians have started keeping a close watch on the satta bazaar for a market assessment of their fortunes. Many candidates monitor the rates on a daily basis just to be sure. And all of them swear by the satta bazaar as the most accurate barometer of public mood. But this time, the oracle is sending out confusing signals. The markets in different cities have conflicting takes on the polls, making the outcome almost impossible to read. No wonder there’s so much talk about hung assemblies and neck-and-neck contests.

GenNext of militant Hindutva

By Newscop

Around the time last week when the full and deadly ramifications of the ‘Hindu’ terror plot were unfolding, a congregation of over 5,000 Muslim clergy of the Deobandi group issued a fatwa against terror, declaring it un-Islamic. It was a historic moment; even if sceptics will raise many ifs and buts about it — why did they wait so long, do they really represent the mass of Muslim opinion and so on.

But here was something Hindutva brigades and their supporters were always asking for — why don’t the more sensible and moderate elements of the community condemn their co-religionists who indulge in terror activity. This resolution went a step forward — it was outright in its rejection of terrorism. What is more, these were not the usual “moderates” that can be found in television studios holding forth in impeccable English; these were straight from the mosques, from where, we are told, messages of hate spew and where fiery future terrorists are spawned.

None of this means that there are no malcontents among Muslims or that there is no such thing as jihadi terrorism. But it does suggest that such elements have no religious sanction and as far as that amorphous entity “the Muslim community” is concerned, all it wants is to live peacefully and equitably like everybody else. This should have been obvious all along, but such was the environment that had been created that even those who should know better were falling for the “all Muslims are not terrorists, but all terrorists are Muslim” line that had become axiomatic.

Using the same yardstick, should we now talk of Hindu terrorism? Does the arrest of several Hindus, who all were allegedly acting on behalf of other Hindus, imply that there is a new kind of angry awakening among the majority community which is provoking at least some of them to take matters in their own hands? Is this going to be followed by more such cases, with armies of vigilante Hindu groups out to take revenge for slights, real and imagined?

About the future one cannot comment, but it is important to point out that this is not ‘Hindu terrorism.’ Not by a long chalk. The perpetrators may claim to be doing it on behalf of Hindus, but no Hindu ever nominated them to do so. Hindus may be angry about a lot of things, including ‘minority appeasement’, but if ever they wanted to express their anger, reposing their trust in an unsmiling Sadhvi, a group of ochre-robed swamis and an army officer would be the least likely way to go about it. I have yet to hear anyone talk about how they would like to plant a bomb near a mosque because that would vindicate all those innocent lives lost in terror attacks and I dare say that would be the majority view. It is possible that incessant media coverage may have given a slight sheen to the Sadhvi or the army officer, but they have not been embraced as the finest examples of how good Hindus should behave.

By stoutly defending Pragya, Lt Col Purohit and others, the BJP and the RSS, upholders of Hindutva so far, have therefore misread the general sentiment among Hindus. In the initial stages, when just the Sadhvi and a couple of others had been arrested, the Parivar’s reaction was one of immediate denial even if she was once a member of the party’s student wing. Then, perhaps because the RSS sensed that there was a bit of sympathy, the “no Hindu can be a terrorist” line was trotted out. But now there is direct support, not merely because she and the others are somehow connected with the Parivar but because they are Hindus and were fighting for the Hindu cause. The motive is clear — this will work in the elections because it could consolidate the Hindu vote, or so the BJP thinks.

But while they may think they have hit upon a clever electoral plan, both the BJP and the RSS are being disingenuous. Supporting terror or alleged terrorists is a dangerous game. Whatever one might say about the Congress’s apparent softness on terror, it has never blatantly supported anyone accused of it. Nor has it justified terror itself. The BJP and its parent the RSS are in danger of doing just that. Their patent hypocrisy apart — they are now proclaiming that no one is guilty unless proved otherwise, a position they conveniently ignored earlier — they are terming wanton killing of innocents as a Hindu cause.

The bigger problem for the RSS is that it may have failed to recognise that these new entrants in the Hindutva game are not the normal Sangh Parivar types. The Sadhvi and her cohorts may well have thought of both the RSS and the BJP as outdated, out of touch and weak. The RSS is now mainly composed of old gents and the BJP is in danger of going beyond its sell-by date, with no young leadership in sight. The younger element is impatient and wants less theorising and more direct action. In time, rabid Hindutva types may follow the Sadhvi rather than the RSS. Such groups, which want to ‘defend’ Hinduism, will do it their own way and that should really scare all of us. The future face of militant Hindutva may already be here.

Indomitable spirit of Mumbaikars

By M H Ahssan & Alex D’souza

Mumbai citizens cannot be blamed for feeling that they are under continuous siege. People stayed up most of Wednesday night and spent Thursday shaken to the core by the ongoing reports of continued assaults. Schools, colleges and many offices were closed, the streets were deserted, the city was almost hiding from itself, it seemed. On Thursday morning, there were signs of life on the streets — buses running, taxis plying — but beneath that calm was a palpable numbness.

All this is completely understandable. The scale of the attack by the terrorists was not only unprecedented but also unimaginable. Terrorists with assault weapons were roaming the streets, shooting people at will in the heart of the city — the nerve centre of the city’s business district. Commuters and passengers at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, people around Metro cinema, diners at Leopold Café and the residents and guests at Mumbai’s two most famous luxury hotels — the Oberoi and the Taj — were all victims. This is what we see in all those Bollywood films the city churns out in large numbers; no one thought that fiction would become a horrible fact of life. If Mumbai offers you one freedom more than any other Indian city, it is the freedom to wander around anywhere at anytime, at will and at whim. The terrorists stole this very basic cornerstone of Mumbai life from the citizens.

But after the numbness passes, Mumbai must wake up to realise that this theft of our spirit was only temporary. We cannot allow shameless terrorists to get away with their vile intentions. Mumbai has not been beaten by the bomb blasts of 1993 or the subsequent assaults by man and nature. At each point, the city has risen the next day — true, there is a compulsion too, since everyone must work for a living. But we do know that to succumb to fear will be to give in to what the terrorists want. The scale of this attack is horrendous, that is undeniable. The fact that the fight at the two hotels and at Nariman House continued through Thursday is also horrific. But this fear cannot be our ruling deity.

Here, the government has to do its duty to instil a sense of confidence. This is done in several ways, physical and psychological. Why close down the stock markets — they are a sign of confidence in not only the city but the country itself. Every effort must be made to get back to a normal routine even though we don’t know what “normal” will be any more. Will we now have to look around fearfully when we go to a restaurant? The trauma will not disappear, but we cannot let it weigh us down.

Through all the disasters that have visited Mumbai, the spirit of the Mumbaikar has asserted itself. After the flood of 2005, it was people who helped each other, opening their homes, hearts and bank balances. For all that Mumbai is called apathetic it is in fact a very giving city: it just does not wear its heart on its sleeve. But when the call comes, Mumbaikars rise to the occasion. It is that which we want to see, so that we can all take courage from each other and find that strength and determination to go on. The time has come for Mumbai to put its heart on display again. It is hurting, but it is still beating strong and true.

Wake-up call for Everybody

By M H Ahssan

Politicans need to rise above petty politics and put national interests at the forefront

What happened in Mumbai on the night of November 26 was not similar to the other terrorist attacks which this country has been subjected to often in the recent past. Some may see comparisons with the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts, which exacted a toll of over 200 lives, or the multiple explosive attacks on the Mumbai suburban trains in 2006.

This, in fact, was a more diabolical attack which targeted foreign businessmen and tourists in India and a clear assertion, as it were, of the jihadi war on crusaders (Americans and Europeans), Zionists (Israelis) and the Hindus. It was targeted at damaging India’s relations with the US and UK and Israel and the commercial relations between India and the US, Western Europe and Israel. It was also aimed at demonstrating, on the eve of some state elections and a few months before the general elections, how vulnerable the Indian state is to terrorist threat and, in the process, cause deep fissures in our polity.

It also exposed the fact that while our anti-terror intelligence tended to focus on intelligence collection on our own people and that too in a fragmented way, statewise, the enemies of India can strike at it from the seas, perhaps from across the state and international boundaries. It thoroughly exposed the weaknesses in our security surveillance system.

We have to wait for a few more days to have a comprehensive assessment of the operation and the identity of those who masterminded this attack. Unlike the previous terrorist attacks in India, which were tended to be ignored by the West, this time foreigners have been killed and their commercial interests are affected. Therefore there is bound to be a lot more foreign interest in this terrorist outrage. One of the queries will be whether this is an operation by jihadis and rogue elements in the Pakistan-based ISI who are opposed to the policies of the newly established democratic government in Pakistan.

It is obvious that this meticulously planned and executed operation would have taken time, a lot of expertise in training the terrorists and elaborate logistics. Since some of the terrorists have been reported to have been captured it should be possible to get information on planners of this attack.

The Indian political parties will now be on trial over whether they will put national interests above their party interests. In the US, when the 9/11 attack took place, the leaders of the Democratic Party immediately rallied behind the Republican Administration and pledged their full support. The Patriot Act, with stringent anti-terrorist measures, passed with bipartisan support. The 9/11 attack was investigated by a bipartisan commission and the recommendations of the commission were implemented. While there may be criticisms in the US about the severity of the Patriot Act and follow-up actions of the Bush administration including the rendition procedures and torture allegations and Guantanamo Bay detention camps, the bipartisan cooperation on anti-terrorist operations have proved so effective that US has not suffered a second attack after 9/11.

Compare that with the behaviour of the Indian political parties. The leader of the much reviled Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS), Hemant Karkare ,was the first among the fatal casualties in this attack as he led his men to fight back the terrorists without any bias, in the discharge of his duties. Do we expect our politicians to apologise to his memory at this stage for casting aspersions on him?

There has been a crying need for the country to have a federal integrated anti-terrorist organisation. Yet some of the chief ministers of the states have been opposing it on the grounds that under the Constitution, law and order is exclusively a state subject. They have no constructive alternative on how to carry out effectively intelligence collection, coordination and counter-terrorist activity across state borders on an all-India basis or how to coordinate the counter-terrorist intelligence within a state with activities of terrorists from across the international borders.

India is perhaps the only country in which a terrorist is not viewed as a terrorist but seen through a communal prism. Terrorism has to be fought effectively by curbing the activities of the terrorists. Law does not condone a crime like murder because there are extenuating circumstances. That may be taken into account in sentencing the convicted. While any group of people may have legitimate grievances and they have a right to agitate to get the grievance rectified in a democracy; no group has a right to resort to terrorist violence and kill innocent people. Instead of adopting such a democratic and humanitarian approach many of our political parties prefer to look at the problem of terrorism from the point of view of electoral politics.

Further there is a very well-known nexus between the politicians, organised crime and sections of bureaucracy which provides a shield behind which the enemies of India are able to operate their terrorist instrumentalities. Therefore fighting terrorism in Indian conditions has proved to be far more difficult than in the rest of the Democratic world.

One wonders whether in the aftermath of this terrible attack on Mumbai our major political parties will unite to create an integrated anti-terrorist organisation like the Department of Homeland Security set up in the US after 9/11. What is more likely is terrorism is likely to become a contentious electoral issue in the forthcoming general elections. Those out to hurt India through a thousand cuts can always take into account our disunity, lack of commitment to national interests on the part of many of our political parties and the politician-organised crime-bureaucracy nexus in planning their attacks on India. It is perhaps because of its manifest destiny India has survived and prospered this far in spite of our politicians who will not unite even under such terrible attacks.

Wanted: An integrated approach for Terrorism

By M H Ahssan

The latest attacks in Mumbai — still unresolved at the time of writing — are aimed at undermining international confidence in India and to instil a sense of pervasive insecurity and terror within the country, in an attempt to weaken the economy at large.

International perceptions of India over the past years have been increasingly positive and there is clearly an effort to alter such perceptions to affect foreign investments as well as tourism.

What remains both tragic and astonishing is that after the attacks on the Marriott Hotel in Pakistan, greater precautionary measures had not been implemented in the country’s top hotels. Security at the Taj and Oberoi (Trident) was virtually non-existent in terms of preventing or containing a terrorist attack of significant magnitude.

There has, for some time now, been a great deal of talk about giving more powers to private security agencies to effectively carry out protective functions in private establishments and particularly for collecting surface intelligence. It is obvious, however, that little has been done in this direction, and private security remains largely cosmetic, particularly in proportion to the challenges of counter-terrorist protection.

As regards the responses, it is premature to speak of particular details of the ongoing operations. However, one thing is clear — specialised counter-terrorism responses remain highly concentrated in particular locations and with elite ‘special force’ units, such as the National Security Guard and small units in the Armed Forces, Paramilitaries and the special Anti Terrorism units in the Police.

At a structural level, there is clearly an excessive measure of over-centralisation and an inability to delegate authority and capacities of response where these are most needed — at the level of the ‘first responders’, the forces available at each thana and police post. Response capacities must be distributed across the country, at the level of the police station and, in urban areas, effective response times must be reduced to between one and three minutes to any terrorist incident. With the absence of such capacities of response, there is little hope that we will be able to reduce the effectiveness of terrorist attacks and the concomitant costs in lives, material and perceptions — both domestic and international.

A comprehensive reorientation and retraining of police forces across the country is now an urgent imperative — one that can brook no further delay. Protocols of counter-terrorism response must not only be clearly defined and disseminated among all security agencies, all personnel must undergo processes of immediate and continuous retraining, including simulated operations and crisis management drills.

It must, by now, be abundantly clear that the prevailing ‘emergency response paradigm’, the principal, if not exclusive, paradigm of response in India, has failed. The challenges of terrorism, proxy and sub-conventional warfare and insurgency are no longer transient ‘emergencies’, but chronic afflictions across vast areas of the country. Permanent and institutionalised mechanisms of response must now be designed to cope with these persistent challenges. Existing institutions are neither sufficient for, nor geared to, the imperatives of response to terrorism.

Crucially, any response that may be evolved or designed must be composite. This implies, first, that responses must be embedded into the permanent institutional mechanisms of security, law and justice administration. Further, weakness in any one aspect of the mechanism, from the first or ‘lowest’ elements of intelligence and policing, and up to the highest levels of administrative, judicial and legislative functions, jeopardise any gains that may be secured by any other part of the system. Similarly gains in one region are often frittered away as conflict and terrorism quickly emerge in another, robbing the nation of any cumulative advantage arising out of counter-terrorism successes or the ‘peace dividend’. Critically, responses must not cancel out one another. The tactical and short-term must be fully reconciled with the strategic and long-term. The endless and ill-informed debates on legal versus developmental versus political versus negotiated versus policing versus military responses are fruitless. This spectrum — from use of extreme force to negotiations and conciliation — is comprehended within the notion of ‘counter-terrorism’.

Mumbai attack shows Lashkar, al Qaeda hand

By M H Ahssan

The coordinated terrorist attacks on Mumbai, which killed over 120 persons and drew more than a 1,000 security men from the Indian Army, Marine Commandos, the National Security Guard commandos besides the local police to neutralise about two dozen young, well-armed terrorists, is one of the most audacious attacks on India and reveal the maturing of a strongly networked terror coalition with links to terrorist groups based in Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Two other attacks of similar nature were the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts and the December 13, 2001 attack on the Indian Parliament. The latest Mumbai attack, in a way, had operational strategies drawn from both the attacks.

The attacks point at the inevitable expansion of the radical fringe within the 150-million strong Muslim community and the increasing influence of al Qaeda or its allies like Lashkar-e-Tayiba on such men spread out across India, particularly in west and south India.

The involvement of the criminal underworld in Mumbai in carrying out the attacks is strongly suspected. The 1993 blasts were carried out by the members gang lead by Dawood Ibrahim, who now lives in Karachi, Pakistan. Dawood was designated as a terrorist supporter in 2003 by the US government for his links with al Qaeda (sharing his smuggling routes with the terror syndicate). Dawood also financed Lashkar activities, a group suspected to have organised the Mumbai attacks.

The latest series of attacks, carried out by a well-trained, indoctrinated cluster of young jihadis, had other similarities with the 1993 serial blasts and the Parliament attack. The objectives, for instance, were more or less the same.

Draw international attention
Cripple the economic hub of the country
Paralyse the government/political process
Provoke communal backlash
Invite more recruits and support for such activities in future

In the Parliament attack, few men, all young, entered the Parliament complex, opened indiscriminate firing and attempted to enter the chamber with the objective of holding political leaders hostage. The 1993 Mumbai blast had targeted some of the well-known landmarks in southern Mumbai, including The Taj and cinema theatres like Metro. There were plans to hold political leaders hostage after entering the Mantralaya (the state secretariat).

Both the attacks had the hand of either Pakistan-based terrorist groups like Jaish-e-Mohammad or LeT or the criminal syndicate led by Dawood Ibrahim, who had the blessings of Pakistan’s intelligence agency, the Inter Services Intelligence.

Few conclusions can be drawn about the nature and strength of the group involved in the Mumbai 2008 attack.

1. The number of terrorists involved in the attack (no less than 24) and the high level of coordination and determination they showed in holding ground for more than 30 hours against one of the world’s best, and experienced, elite commando force and soldiers point to the involvement of a well-established and highly networked terrorist group or alliance like LeT.

2. LeT has been involved in attacks like the Red Fort [Images] attack of 2000, the Parliament Attack of 2001, the Akshardham attack of 2002 and Bangalore IIM attack of 2005 where a modus operandi similar to the Mumbai 2008 attack — open attack with assault rifles –was used.

3. The terrorists involved in the attack, as in the past cases, are likely to be `volunteers` and not members of the suspect terrorist groups. This is the strategy which al Qaeda has been utilising over the past seven years.

4. The attack was carefully planned, and most likely monitored closely by the masterminds from safe distances. The targets were selected for their visibility, impact, lax security, easy accessibility, hostage taking, and to find convenient fortifications to counter police action.

5. The attack of this magnitude need to be rehearsed and the target locations recceed several times. Most likely, the targets were recceed the morning of the attack.

6. The attack could not have taken place without a local support base, most likely involving the criminal underworld which has a substantial presence in Mumbai.

7. The use of assault rifles and hand grenades point to the involvement of the Mumbai underworld, likely to be the one controlled by Dawood whose association with ISI is well known.

Given these factors and similarities in modus operandi, selection of targets and use of sophisticated weapons and explosives, the involvement of a similar groups with links to ISI becomes highly probable. The suspicion also gathers strength from the role of ISI in carrying out a suicide bombing against the Indian Embassy in Kabul in July 2008. The suicide bomber was a Lashkar operative. LeT has been operating several training camps in North West Frontier Province and Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir where, according to a well-respected Pakistani magazine Herald, recruits, both from Pakistan and other countries, have been training in fidayeen or suicide missions since 2006.

LeT operates a huge empire of schools and charity organisations under the camouflage of a social and religious organisation, Jamaat-ud Dawa from Lahore. LeT chief Hafiz Saeed has been promoting anti-India and anti-Western feelings during his Friday prayers. As recent as October 13, he told his audience that, ‘India understands only one language that is jihad’. He argued that, ‘India has blocked the water of River Chenab and constructed the Baglihar Dam. Pakistan has failed to stop India from doing so. The only reason is, all this has happened because jihad has been abandoned. India understands only one language ie the language of jihad… jihad cannot be suppressed. In fact, with little support, it can break apart India just like the former USSR.’

The LeT, a pro-Wahhabi group, has been a key instrument of the ISI in sidelining different Deobandi terrorist groups active in India, including Kashmir for the past few years. One of the founding members of LeT has been Abdullah Azzam, a Palestinian jihadi ideologue, more famous as Osama bin Laden’s teacher.

Fear of a Saffron Telangana haunts Muslims

Persistent calls for a separate Telangana have forced the Muslim minority to take a firm stand against the demand that recalls a history of oppression , which still haunts them, says HNN Editor in Chief M H Ahsan

The fear psychosis that has gripped Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimoon (MIM) and other organizations about the future prospects of Muslims in a separate Telangana state goes beyond the community, if one scrutinizes the manifestoes of the principal political players battling for their own turfs in that region as it lurches towards statehood.

What is at stake is not only the future of Muslims who are apprehensive over the likelihood of RSS calling the shots on behalf of the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS). There is also a question mark over the future of economic development of Telangana, given the fact that all the dominant players, especially TRS and Praja Rajyam Party (PRP) of Telugu mega star Chiranjeevi, are bending over backward to court the landless labourers of Telangana.

Past experience has shown that when parties come to power, their own interests take precedence. Development programs are placed on the back burner unless they translate into lucrative deals for politicians. The TRS, which calls itself the pink party, symbolizing its determination to help the poor, has constructed its headquarters—Telangana Bhavan—on a one-acre plot on No.10 Banjara Hills. According to the TRS website, the party sees it as a “light house” steering the statehood movement. What arouses concern among the people is whether this light house will guide everyone towards the shores of economic development or shine its light selectively and leave others to fend for themselves.

The current political scenario suggests that all the parties are playing the game of one-upmanship to woo the farmers and landless labourers. This has also prompted the BJP to jump on board the Telangana bandwagon and feather its own nest. As a result, the political temperature in the Telangana region is shooting up, paving the way for the realignment of political forces in the region. Its impact has also been felt on the Muslim United Forum (MUF), a 12-member amalgamation comprising political, religious and social groups. What has knit them together is their common cause for a united Andhra Pradesh.

Their opposition to the formation of a new state is prompted by their deep-rooted fear that history may repeat itself, this time under the garb of a ‘Saffron Telangana’ even if the pawns on the political chess board seem to make innocuous moves by claiming that small is beautiful. As senior BJP leader Sushma Swaraj explained recently, her party has revved up the agitation for a separate Telangana state, as it supports the concept of smaller States.

But MIM dismisses such talk as a political self-deception. “Muslim opposition to a separate Telangana is not new. We opposed Telangana state during the violent agitation in 1969 too. And this opposition has continued till date,” Asaduddin Owaisi, the new boss of Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM), told HNN.

“So, how can Congress ignore the apprehensions of this big group of minorities,” the MIM leader asked. As an indicator of the shape of things to come if a new state is formed, he cited the Vatoli incident in which a family of six Muslims was beaten and burnt to death in a Telangana village. However, the stand taken by the Muslim leadership has put the Congress brass in a dilemma. It risks alienating the community if it flows with the tide. On the contrary, it could cede ground to its political opponents, including Telugu Desam Party, which made a volta-face on separate Telangana, if it vetoes the move.

The stakes are high. MIM, which is a part of MUF and has five legislators and one MP from Hyderabad, would like to see the city as a union territory should a separate Telangana state become inevitable. “Give us our Hyderabad back,” the late MIM President Sultan Salahuddin Owaisi once remarked during a meeting with the chief minister. Owaisi, who represented Hyderabad in the Lok Sabha for two decades, was obviously referring to Muslim rule over this 400-year-old city.

Muslims constitute about 40 percent of the four million population of Hyderabad. Their population in nine other districts of the region varies from eight to 15 percent. Muslim reluctance, in the face of overwhelming support for a Telangana state, has a rationale behind it, say leaders of the Muslim United Forum (MUF), of which MIM is a member. It .could sharpen the political divide and jeopardise the interests of the minorities. The forum leaders feel that the notorious Razakar movement during the Telangana armed struggle rankles the memories of the average Telangana Hindu and the political parties.

This has distorted their general perception about Muslims, whom they tar with the same brush. “Razakars” (volunteers), the brutal Muslim private army during the Nizam’s regime, had persecuted innocent people in connivance with Deshmuks and other feudal landlords. Though more than 50 per cent of the population was non-Muslim, the Telangana armed struggle was basically projected as anti-Muslim,” says Sk Yusuf Baba, an analyst.

Following the police action against the armed struggle during the 1950s, several thousand Muslim men were killed by hoodlums, their women raped or forced to commit suicide by leaping into wells to safeguard their honour. Muslim properties were torched and their agricultural lands were confiscated, resulting in an exodus from the affected rural areas and towns to Hyderabad. However, the deep-seated communal hatred against Muslims living in several outlying districts of Marathwada and the Hyderabad-Karnatak region of erstwhile Hyderabad state, unleashed a reign of terror and brutalities against them. But this dark chapter in Telangana’s history has remained a dark secret, he claimed.

In the light of this tragic flashback into its history, Moulana Hameeduddin Auqil Hussami, Chairman of MUF and a prominent religious scholar, said. the division of the state is a nightmare for Muslims. “In the interest of the community, the Muslims have remained united as far as an undivided state is concerned,” he notes.

After being transformed from rulers to subjects overnight, following the police action against the Nizam’s Hyderabad state in 1948, Muslims were seized with an acute sense of insecurity resulting from the trifurcation of Hyderabad , which divided them into three political and geographical entities. With the change in official language in government offices, thousands of Muslim employees, who knew only Urdu, remained jobless and were chucked out of their jobs. Thus, the socio-economic deprivation of the Muslims, which began in the early 1950s, got accentuated with their systematic exploitation by the people of Telangana.

It also revives bitter memories of past events that culminated in the signing of the Gentlemen’s Agreement in 1956 by Andhra and Telangana leaders for the implementation of domicile rules. Known as Hyderabad Mulki Rules, they stipulated a 12- year domicile in the Telangana area as a minimum period to qualify for mulki (a local). status. This agreement triggered clashes between the Sunni migrants and the local Shias. Even though there was a large-scale migration of Shias from rural areas and towns in Telangana districts to Hyderabad, they were still subservient to the Sunnis who dominated the socio-political and economic fields of activity of the community.

According to Moulana Auqil, an attempt was made in 1969 by the then Chief Minister Kasu Brahmananda Reddy to create a rift between the Sunnis and Shias over a separate Telangana issue. “The leaders, particularly of MIM, are elite Sunnis, who constitute a minority group among Muslims opposing a separate Telangana state for the reasons cited above. These leaders had played into the hands of Chief Minister Reddy, who used them as a tool in muzzling the Telangana movement in 1969.

Today, they are being instigated by the present Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy who is vehemently opposed to the Telangana movement,” an analyst on Muslim affairs told TSI. “The powerful minority Sunnis, who were outsiders and settled here during the Nizam’s regime, have gradually emerged as the representatives of the poor, forlorn Shias. And now these leaders are in the process of making the Muslim masses a party to their intrigues.”

But this argument was dismissed as ‘ridiculous’ by a MIM leader who was quick to point out that in the event of the formation of a new state, the tally of the seats of their party will go up in the elections. Referring to the inter-ethnic competition and Sunni supremacy on the political scene, a social analyst and poet Syed Yakoob said ethnicity may develop in response to the domestic need to acquire status rather than as a result of any other consideration. Muslims constitute 9.2 per cent of Andhra Pradesh’s population of 76 million, as per the 2001 census. Their population in nine other districts of the Telangana region is about 17 per cent. They constitute about 40 per cent of the four million population of Hyderabad

The MUF leaders point out that what raises their concern is the fact that the Telangana movement has been hijacked by parties like the BJP and the so-called secular TRS, which claims to represent the cultural face of Telangana. This is just a façade, as it is dominated by leaders with their roots in the RSS. This breeds a sense of insecurity among Muslims in the event of a separate state coming into existence. For instance, A. Narendra, who holds number two slot in the TRS, resigned from the BJP to join the TRS and become a staunch supporter of party chief K. Chandrasekhara Rao. But he still retains his links with the RSS and was implicated by some Muslim groups for his role in the Hyderabad communal riots in the past.

The TRS also got a booster dose from BJP leader and prime ministerial candidate Lal Krishna Advani when he extended his party’s support for a separate state in order to speed up its development. “We want that you people have your own state soon,” Advani said while addressing TRS workers at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi recently.

Against this backdrop, it is not difficult to understand why the BJP reiterates its support to the TRS on the issue of carving a separate state of Telangana out of Andhra Pradesh. What distances the MUF leadership further from the TRS is the latter’s bid to keep Muslim leaders in the dark during the ongoing negotiations over the separatist issue.

TRS pledge to work for the downtrodden also needs to be taken with a pinch of salt. Reporting on the inauguration of the Telangana Bhavan on Banjara Hill, The Times of India said that besides the initial outlay of Rs. 5 crores, an equal amount will have to be raised to equip the party’s headquarters with all amenities. Big business houses have reportedly pitched in with the balance amount to complete the building surmounted by a large dome resembling the White House.

With a built-up area of about 40,000 sq ft, it is said to be the largest office building of any political party in the country. These events fuel doubt and speculation whether TRS will live up to the expectation of its people for a rosy future with the formation of a separate Telangana state. Whether the pink party can deliver on its promise is the issue.

India’s diamond trade under fire

By M H Ahssan

A passage through India is giving Africa’s blood diamonds a respectable polish. According to reports, blood diamonds are being smuggled into the city of Surat, where they are cut and polished, then sold to respectable firms which go on to easing these illegal stones into the legitimate diamond supply chain.

Surat is the center of the world’s diamond cutting and polishing industry. Ninety-two percent of the world’s diamonds are crafted here. Located 250 kilometers north of Mumbai, the city earned India US$11 billion in exports last year. According to media reports, a sizeable number of rough diamonds entering Surat for cutting and polishing might in fact be blood diamonds.

Blood diamonds or conflict diamonds are those mined in war-torn African countries such as Liberia, the Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone and the Republic of Congo by warlords and rebels to finance arms purchases and other illegal activities.

Blood diamonds account for a small fraction of the diamond trade. At the height of the problem in the mid-1990s, about 4% of the global diamond trade was blood diamonds, according to the diamond industry. Global Witness, an international non-governmental organization that has drawn attention to human-rights abuse in resource-linked conflicts, puts the figure at 15%.

The role of blood diamonds in funding and prolonging wars and in devastating communities in west and southwest Africa has been immense. An international campaign highlighting this prompted the United Nations to pass a resolution calling for the creation of an international certification scheme to break the link between the illicit trade in rough diamonds and mass human-rights abuses associated with armed conflict.

This put pressure on the international community and the diamond industry to act. The Kimberly Process Certification Scheme was put in place in 2003 to regulate the trade in rough diamonds, that is, to prevent trade in blood diamonds while protecting the legitimate trade in diamonds. It is aimed at assuring buyers of diamonds that their stones have not contributed to bloodshed. It involves monitoring of diamonds at every point of the diamond pipeline, from mining through to retail, to ensure that diamonds from areas that the UN calls “conflict zones” do not slip into the legitimate supply chain.

The diamond industry maintains that the Kimberley process has solved the problem and that less than 1% of the diamonds in the market today are from conflict zones. However, a 2006 UN report drew attention to blood diamonds from rebel-held areas in the Ivory Coast skirting a UN diamond embargo and being smuggled out through neighboring Ghana and Mali.

According to investigative media reports, blood diamonds are smuggled into Surat in fishing boats. These are cut and polished in the diamond bazaars of this town, sold to reputed firms who then export the stones with a certification that they were not imported from conflict areas.

Officials of the Surat Diamond Association, an industry organization which has about 3,000 diamond establishments in Surat as its members, insist that the industry is scrupulously observing international norms and respects the ban on dealing with blood diamonds.

“We are aware of the implications [of dealing in blood diamonds] internationally and we are very careful,” insists Umesh Shah of the Mumbai-based Shrenuj and Company, a leading diamond and jewelry manufacturer and exporter.

“Our customers in the US and Europe compel us to follow the processes, and we in turn ensure that the rough diamonds that we get are 100% conflict-free,” points out Sohil Kothari, director, Fine Jewelry (India) Pvt Ltd, a leading exporter of diamond studded jewelry.

But a diamond exporter from Surat who spoke on condition of anonymity told Asia Times Online that there might be a handful of diamond merchants who are dealing in conflict diamonds. These are mainly owners of smaller diamond establishments. “The larger establishments are wary of tarnishing their reputation and reliability,” he pointed out.

Indian intelligence officials say that blood diamonds will have to be identified before they enter Surat as once a rough diamond is polished it is impossible to trace its place of origin. “If we have to catch blood diamonds it has to be at the very point of their entry, that is, at the airports and seaports,” says an official of the Department of Revenue Intelligence (DRI).

DRI officials say that the diamond cutting establishments are under their scanner and that they are keeping an eye on them. But they are wary of acting without adequate evidence, given the impact it will have on the industry. Diamond polishing is a major foreign exchange earner. It consists of about 6,000 small and large diamond cutting and polishing units and employs over 700,000 people.

The officials insist that if evidence is found, they will act because the stain of dealing with blood diamonds will damage the industry’s reputation.

A diamond exporter from Mumbai described the allegations against Surat’s diamond dealings as “a motivated campaign” by competitors in the international arena. The growth of India’s diamond industry has been “phenomenal”, he said, and has triggered envy among communities that have traditionally dominated the business, and this might be behind their “disinformation campaign”, he said.

Indians account for about 65% of the $26 billion in diamond trade revenues, up from about 25% two decades ago. The share of Jewish businessmen has apparently fallen from 70% to 25% in the same period as Indian businessmen make inroads into the traditional Jewish-dominated hub of Antwerp in Belgium and Tel Aviv.

Indian merchants say that given the fierce competition overseas they are anxious to ensure that their credibility and image remain good; hence they are keen that the “government cracks down on those dealing in blood diamonds, if there are any”.

India’s flawed diamond dream

By M H Ahssan

India, having elbowed aside Antwerp in the international diamond cutting and polishing business, is looking to boot the Belgian city from its perch as capital of the world’s diamond market.

About 80% of the world’s rough diamonds and half its polished diamonds are bought and sold in Antwerp, home to 1,500 retail and wholesale diamond companies and four diamond exchanges. Six decades ago, the city was home to all the world’s diamond exchanges. Four remain, while 20 have sprung up in other parts of the world, including Dubai and Mumbai.

Indian traders arrived in Antwerp in the mid-1970s, challenging the centuries-long control by Orthodox Jews of the diamond trade there. By the 1990s, the Jews were ready to surrender and Indians today account for two-thirds of Antwerp’s US$36 billion diamond trade, with the Jewish share of trade reduced to just 25% from 70% two decades ago.

The Indian diamantaires (as Antwerp’s diamond traders are called) belong to a few hundred families, many related by marriage, from the Jain community from Palanpur, a small village in Gujarat. They are recognized for their entrepreneurial talent and in a trade that runs on trust, the Indians – like the Jews before them – have benefited from close family ties.

The Indian diamantaires started at the bottom end of the business, working on low-quality rough diamonds that existing big players weren’t interested in. Then they outsourced the cutting and polishing business to India – the cost of labor was 80% lower back home; the finishing work went to family-owned businesses in Mumbai and the Gujarat port city of Surat. Larger profit margins enabled the Indian diamantaires to invest and expand and they climbed the value chain, buying and selling pricier stones until they soon overtook their Jewish counterparts in the trade.

Yet even with Indians dominating the trade in Antwerp, the city’s decision-making business councils remained elusive to them for several years. That began changing in 2003 when two Indian diamantaires were elected to Antwerp’s High Diamond Council, the governing body of the city’s diamond industry. In 2006, Indians won five of the six elected seats on the 11-member board.

Surat meanwhile emerged as the center of the diamond cutting and polishing business, to the point that 92% of the world’s diamonds are now cut and polished there and the 800,000 workers involved earned India $11 billion in exports last year. Antwerp now has a bare 800 cutters and polishers, down from 25,000 in the 1970s.

Having eclipsed Antwerp in the cutting and polishing business, Indian diamond traders want to make Mumbai the world’s diamond hub. They have the backing of the Indian government, which announced zero duty on import of polished diamonds last year, when almost $2 billion worth of cut and polished diamonds were imported. That will give a further boost to the diamond jewelry-making business.

The Reserve Bank of India, meanwhile, is helping traders by allowing advance payment without any bank guarantee for procurement of rough diamonds from five miners – Rio Tinto, BHP, Angola’s Endiama, and Russia’s Alrosa and Gokhran. The commerce ministry has also held talks with governments of diamond mining countries to secure a stead long-term supply of roughs – or uncut stones.

The Bharat Diamond Bourse, a single window operation facility and dedicated custom house to boost trade, is being built. Intended to be among the most modern and secure diamond trading hubs in Asia, it is being touted as India’s answer to the Antwerp Diamond Center.

The purchase of diamonds direct from miners helps to reduce India’s dependence on trading hubs other than Antwerp, such as London, and cut intermediary costs, while it may help to ensure long-term supplies from Russia and mining countries in Africa, at the same time reducing the role of the sales and marketing arm of South African giant De Beers, the Diamond Trading Corporation, which controls 80% of global trade in rough diamonds.

In 2006, Diamond India Limited, which consists of members of the diamond trade, was set up to source and procure roughs directly from Russia, Botswana, South Africa, Angola and others and sell them to Indian manufacturers.

Import of rough diamonds from Russia has already started. The purchases are being made from state-owned Russian firms such as Alrosa and Gokhran. According to reports, Indian importers have been ordering diamonds worth about $10 million to $12 million directly from Russia and that amount could soar. “We are ready to buy up to $1 billion worth of diamonds annually from Russia,” Praveen Shankar Pandya, convenor for rough sourcing at the Gems and Jewelry Export Promotion Council, has said.

To encourage stronger partnerships in Africa, India will offer in return for uncut stones training in diamond cutting and polishing and help to build local industries by providing technical assistance.

All that, however, may not be enough to overcome the obstacles standing between India’s diamond firms and their dreams. Not least is the country’s own bureaucracy, typified by the lethargic progress of the Bharat Diamond Bourse project. Perhaps as damaging, industry watchers say the diamond industry in Mumbai is not transparent, with hawala transactions (or informal value transfer systems) common, while security is far from what is available at other trading centers.

Indian bureaucracy
The involvement in the trade of numerous government officials adds to costs and inefficiency. Instead of a one-window interaction with the government, diamond companies in India have to deal with multiple ministries and at central, state and local level. Value added tax has to be paid – only to be returned, though only after the government has held on to it for a while; diamond traders complain this is effectively a block on funds.

Recent developments have also taken the polish from India’s ambitions. The supply of roughs is slowing and likely to worsen following a decision by De Beers to cut out out several Indian sightholders (clients) under its global rough diamond distribution plan. A strengthening rupee and the economic slowdown in the US too have taken their toll.

The rupee gained against the world’s leading currencies last year, notably 12.3% against the US dollar, undermining the competitiveness of India’s diamond jewelry exports. Exports to the US, which accounted for 60% of diamonds exported from India in the 2006-07 financial year, fell almost 50% from 12 months earlier, a decline aggravated by a 6.5% import duty on diamond jewelry from India though not applicable to countries like Thailand.

The impact on orders has been felt in the polishing business, with around 2,000 polishing units in Surat being closed in recent months, according to business daily, Mint, citing Pravin Nanavaty, a member of the Gujarat Hira Bourse, an association of diamond traders from that region.

African diamond producing countries are meanwhile considering imposing exports duties of 5-7%, which will drive up the cost for Indian imports of roughs; at the same time African producers are demanding that polishing units be set up on their soil, which will force the further closure or relocation of Surat’s polishing units.

India’s share of the diamond processing business, which stands at 57% now (in value terms), could shrink to 49% by 2015, according to a survey by consulting firm KPMG,

India’s polishers also face intensifying competition from other countries. China is expanding its cutting and polishing business, and with over 30,000 polishers stands second only to India. It has been processing larger diamonds for jewelry making and importing roughs worth about $1 billion a year. Several Indian companies have in fact set up polishing units in south China.

Dubai is also challenging India’s ambitions, attracting diamond traders with new facilities and incentives such as tax holidays. Helping the Gulf state, and unlike Antwerp which is bound by EU rules, Dubai is far more lenient regarding the transfer of money.

The progress of Dubai’s Almas (Diamond) Tower perhaps best captures the difference in ambition and determination between the two country’s diamond businesses. Work on the Almas Tower began in 2005; it was completed on schedule in December. In comparison, Mumbai’s Bharat Diamond Bourse, conceived in 1992 and due to be completed in 1996, has yet to get off the ground. The new deadline for the bourse’s opening is early 2009.

Indian bombs shake diamond trade

India’s diamond industry, already rattled by the weakening global economy, has had its confidence further damaged by the discovery in the past few weeks of more than 20 bombs in Surat, the center of the world’s diamond cutting and polishing business. The outlook has also been marred by violent protests for higher pay in the sector.

Since 29 July, when the first live bomb was discovered, 25 bombs have been found and defused in Surat, in Gujarat state. While the bombs were recovered before they could cause any damage, their discovery in areas like Varachha, home to most of the town’s diamond processing units triggered panic. At least six bombs were found in Varachha’s Mini Diamond Bazaar.

More than 800,000 workers cut and polish rough diamonds in Surat, earning India US$11 billion in exports last year. Around 92% of the world’s diamond roughs are cut and polished in the town.

The bombs were part of a wider campaign apparently aimed at damaging India’s economy. More than 50 people were killed when 25 bombs ripped through Ahmedabad and Bangalore a few days before the Surat bombs were discovered. Ahmedabad is a prosperous commercial hub, while Bangalore is India’s IT capital. Analysts believe that the bombs in Surat were aimed at striking terror at the heart of India’s – indeed of the world’s – diamond trade.
“Surat is a huge city, but considering all the bombs were planted in areas where the diamond industry is based, I think there is a message in that,” Pravinbhai Nanavati, vice president of the Southern Gujarat Chambers of Commerce and Industry, told the BBC. “The bombs [in Surat] were planted by those who wanted to hurt India economically,” he observed, underlining the fact that “stopping production for one day in the diamond industry means a loss of US$28 million”.

The threat of terrorism comes at a bad time for India’s diamond industry. In early July, workers in cutting and polishing units in Surat and Bhavnagar went on a strike to press for higher wages. With hundreds of thousands of workers out on the streets, workshops were forced to down shutters. The Surat Diamond Traders Association recommended a 20% salary hike to defuse the crisis.

With the strike over and concern at the discovery of bombs having eased, workshops are again humming with activity. But beneath the calm worries remain.

July saw a “roughly 35% downturn in business because of recession,” Kamlesh Jhaveri, director of the Mumbai-headquartered London Star Diamond Company, told Asia Times Online. The US imports around $40 billion worth diamonds from India – in 2006-07 it accounted for 60% of diamonds exported from India – and the slowing US economy has hit the Indian diamond industry hard.

To add to these woes, the Diamond Trading Corporation, which controls 80% of the global trade in rough diamonds, last month announced a 5% increase in the price of roughs. The price of roughs had increased 8.5% earlier this year amid strong demand for diamonds in India, China and the Middle East and reduced supply.

The supply of roughs, already on the wane in recent years has tightened further with several Indian sightholders being cut out by De Beers under its global rough diamond distribution plan.

Although cutting and polishing of diamonds gives the stones their sparkle, the process yields thin margins as the cost of the raw material accounts for 85-95% of the selling price. With the cost of diamond roughs surging these margins have shrunk further. Thousands of factories in Surat, Bhavnagar and other towns in Gujarat are said to have shut down over the past year.

Competition to Surat has also grown, with diamond mining countries in Africa demanding that cutting and processing units be set up there. Analysts have also warned of looming competition from China’s cutting and polishing business.

Media reports have said that the recent threat of terrorism to Surat and the wage hike for workers will add to the industry’s growing woes. These reports have pointed out that foreign buyers who would have started streaming into Surat now for purchase of diamonds ahead of the Christmas season have put off plans fearing terrorist attacks. The wage hike will meanwhile add to costs and cut into margins, they argue.

Disagreeing with these reports, Jhaveri points out that Surat is a manufacturing hub and few foreign buyers go there for their purchases, anyway. As for the impact of higher wages on operating costs, it is likely to be lower than that being reported. The recommendations for a wage increase are just that – they are recommendations and aren’t binding in nature. “With monitoring of implementation of these recommendations weak, it is unlikely that workers in small units will get more than a 15% hike,” Jhaveri told Asia Times Online.

What could happen, however, especially if terrorism concerns were to deepen, is that workers could chose to move out of Surat to smaller towns in Gujarat that would be less likely to be targeted by terrorists. Smaller processing units might also shift to smaller towns to cut operating costs.

Contrary to media reports that point to processing units and workers shifting to Africa or China, Jhaveri says the move, if any, will be within Gujarat.

The cost of cutting and polishing a karat of stone in Africa works out to $70-$75 compared with a maximum of $20-$25 in India, Jhaveri said.

“It might not make much of difference to Israeli or Antwerp diamantaires, who have factories in Africa as they are looking at similar costs back home. But for Indian diamantaires, who have the cheap labor option that Surat and other towns in Gujarat provide, shifting processing units to Africa doesn’t make economic sense,” he said. Around five Indian companies have factories in South Africa and Botswana.

As for the China threat, labor cost there is also higher than that in India. China is focussing on bigger and better-quality diamonds. At the same time, processing units in China are not concentrated and so lack the benefits of infrastructure offered in India.

The China threat to India’s diamond processing business has been grossly exaggerated to help India’s processors can wring concessions from the government in New Delhi, said one industry insider, who wished to remain anonymous.

Nor will the displacement of Surat and other towns in Gujarat in the cutting and polishing business, “ever happen”, said Jhaveri. The advantages these towns and their workers possess are unparalleled.

Gujarat in general and Surat in particular has repeatedly shown resilience in the face of adversity such as natural and man-made disasters. The entrepreneurial spirit of its people has made it a favorite investment destination, despite the blows it suffers.

The town was repeatedly raided and looted by the Maratha king Sivaji in the 17th century, fire destroyed the city in 1837 and more recently it has suffered communal riots (1992, 2002), an outbreak of a plague epidemic (1994) and floods (2006). The floods in Surat cost the diamond polishing units $60 million, yet the city has quickly bounced back, registering an 11.8% growth rate this year.
Surat might be shaken after the discovery of bombs but its spirit has certainly not been shattered.

India in the dark over terror attack

By M H Ahssan

The bloody trail of terror attacks continues in India. Delhi was the target this weekend, with TV channels splattered with the increasingly common pictures of gory scenes and wailing relatives – and the country nowhere closer to stopping the bloodshed.

Five serial bomb blasts (in the space of 45 minutes) killed at least 25 and wounded more than 100 people, most out on Saturday evening, shopping for a festival and a holiday season.

Terrorists struck at the heart of the capital’s entertainment, commercial and shopping hub, Connaught Place, and the casualties would have been much higher had two bombs not been defused at the same location.

The pattern of the attacks has been the same over the past two years of incidents across the country, including Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Varanasi, that have claimed thousands of lives.

The bombs used are easy to assemble and difficult to detect as they used low-to-medium intensity ammonium nitrate packets filled with scrap iron that turns into deadly shrapnel when the device is ignited.

The remote-controlled bombs are strategically placed (in dustbins, on cycles) at carefully chosen soft targets such as crowded weekend markets in the evening, landmarks and places of worship to inflict maximum damage.

In May, similar serial blasts killed 80 people and injured 200 in the western Indian city of Jaipur, the capital of the tourist state Rajasthan. Serial explosions in Ahmedabad, in Gujarat state, in July left more than 50 dead and over 200 injured.

The latest Delhi bombings have been claimed by the Indian Mujahideen (IM), an Islamist militant group, which sent an online warning by hacking into the e-mail address of a Mumbai-based private firm. The IM has claimed responsibility for blasts in Bangalore, Ahmedabad and Jaipur in the past three months, again via hacked Wi-Fi accounts.

Indian intelligence and security agencies say the IM is derived from elements in the Bangladesh-based Harkat-ul Jihad al-Islami and the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Toiba, with the local banned Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) being a party.

The IM came into national focus for the first time in November last year, following bomb blasts in three trial courts in Uttar Pradesh, a large central Indian state with a sizeable Muslim population and marked by a lack of development and millions of poor.

Emails were sent to the media and authorities minutes before the bombs exploded – a pattern that has been followed in subsequent blasts.

Officials say they are in particular looking for a tech-savvy SIMI functionary named Abdul Subhan Qureshi, alias Tauqeer, considered to be a mastermind in the Ahmedabad blasts.

Tauqeer is reported to be a computer engineer based in Mumbai and a former employee of software major Wipro. He is strongly suspected to have designed the bombs in Surat and possibly Ahmedabad and now Delhi.

Failure of security
Despite claims of breakthroughs and arrests in the recent past, especially in Gujarat and Mumbai, it is apparent that the Indian security networks have failed in detecting and preventing terror attacks.

Although security agencies claim the situation would be much worse were it not for their preventive vigil and crackdowns, their comments do not inspire much public confidence.

Officials also privately admit that the entire security apparatus is geared towards protecting important people such as politicians and their families, leaving little manpower and money for ground-level security and counter-terrorism exercises.

Even if police do manage to arrest Qureshi, would the attacks stop? It appears unlikely, and there is even an air of helplessness among those who are supposed to protect citizens. This was reflected in a security review chaired by federal Home Minister Shivraj Patil following the Delhi blasts.

Intelligence Bureau chief P C Haldar is reported to have said that it was difficult to track every terror module of the IM, which has enrolled people from many cities in India. Haldar is reported to have admitted that the hierarchy and structure of the IM are still hazy.

He reportedly said that given their mutually exclusive style of operations, the IM cells that have been cracked are not in a position to provide clues about the activities of others.

Earlier, in a more damning self-indictment, National Security Advisor (NSA) M K Narayanan, who reports to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh directly, blamed the intelligence agencies that he ironically leads, for not providing “actionable intelligence” on attacks.

The NSA reportedly told the cabinet that there was no warning about the attack on Jaipur in May. “There is no proper coordination between the state intelligence-gathering machinery and the Federal Intelligence Bureau [IB - that looks at internal security matters]. The inputs provided by the IB are imprecise.”

Yet, the security agencies cannot be blamed in isolation of the political leaders, who are engaged in another round of brinkmanship, instead of giving serious thought to revamping the security apparatus.

Narendra Modi, Gujarat’s chief minister belonging to the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), claimed he had personally alerted Manmohan about an impending attack in Delhi.

“Ten days back when I met the prime minister and the NSA, I informed them that the people arrested in connection with the Gujarat blasts had told the police that a plan was on for blasts in Delhi. Only the location was not known,” he said.

However, such broad assertions are always suspect, especially with general elections slated in India next summer and the BJP keen to paint the Congress-led New Delhi government as soft on terror.

Following the terror attacks in Jaipur (where a provincial BJP government rules), Modi said that terror warnings from Delhi to the states are like vague weather bulletins that nobody can take them seriously nor understand.

The BJP has been calling for the reinstatement of anti-terror laws, such as the Prevention of Terrorism Act, 2002, that was scrapped by the Congress due to alleged human rights violations, especially against Muslims, that the party counts as its support base.

Yet, the problem is beyond just laws. The preventive mechanism is woefully inadequate and India’s lax security structure has become a fertile ground for terror groups to gain cheap global publicity via easy-to-execute attacks, without incurring much expenditures or risk of lives to their cadres.

The tip of India’s terror iceberg

By M H Ahssan

A wave of bomb blasts in four Indian cities over the past few months has drawn attention to a new, shadowy terror outfit which calls itself the Indian Mujahideen (IM).

In less than a year of existence, the group has a high rate of terror strikes – 43 bomb blasts over a four-month period in four cities leaving over 140 dead. The frequency and potency of the attacks have left India significantly rattled.

But it is not just the IM’s capacity for terror that is troubling India. Just as worrying is the fact that the IM is, as its name suggests, Indian. Unlike terror outfits the Lashkar-e-Toiba, the Jaish-e-Mohammed or the Harkat-ul Jihad al-Islami (HUJI), which are based across the border in Pakistan or Bangladesh, the IM – like the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) – is a homegrown outfit.

Although some of its funding might come from abroad – on Sunday, a Saudi national was detained at Delhi airport on suspicion of funding the IM – its members are Indian Muslims.

The IM first surfaced in November last year, when it sent an e-mail to a television channel minutes before serial blasts rocked civil courts in Varanasi, Faisabad and Lucknow in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh. In May this year, it sent another claiming responsibility for seven blasts which killed 63 people and injured over 200 in the tourist hub of Jaipur.

In July, the IM struck in quick succession in Bangalore and then Ahmedabad. Four minutes before 17 bombs ripped through Ahmedabad, an e-mail sent in the name of the IM warned India would soon, “feel the terror of death”. And then on September 13, the IM struck in Delhi, with five bombs exploding in busy commercial areas killing 8 and injuring 130. Once again the group claimed responsibility via e-mail for the blasts, saying they were intended to “stop the heart of India from beating”.

Indian intelligence sources say a pattern is emerging which exposes the IM’s modus operandi.

The IM plants bombs, made of easily available substances like ammonium nitrate (fertilizer) and nails, in crowded places and triggers them with timers during peak times to cause the maximum casualties.

Above all, “Its attacks carry the group’s macabre signature – real-time e-mails to media outlets claiming responsibility for the blasts,” an official of the Intelligence Bureau (IB) told Asia Times Online, adding that the e-mails are being sent through unsecured Wi-Fi internet connections.

The IM has used e-mails not only to claim responsibility for blasts but also to lay out its manifesto. The e-mails reveal that while it is inspired by the rhetoric of pan-Islamic groups, its motives clearly stem from anger directed against the Indian state.

The group’s outlook was most explicitly detailed in the e-mail that preceded the Ahmedabad blasts, which it said were revenge for the Gujarat riots of 2002 in which over 2,500 people, mainly Muslims, were killed. It also drew attention to alleged injustices suffered by the Muslim community at the hands of the state, the police, the courts and enquiry commissions.

This anger with the country’s justice system was expressed in its first e-mail, when it justified the attacks in Uttar Pradesh as revenge for lawyers beating up and refusing to defend three “innocent group members” detained for allegedly plotting the abduction of Congress party member of parliament Rahul Gandhi.

In its e-mail preceding the Delhi blasts, the IM railed against the approach taken by the Indian police, the media and the judiciary to terrorism, claiming it is hypocritical. “Why is it that Sangh parivar [a family of Hindu right wing organizations] violence is never dealt with the same intensity as Islamic terror?” it asked.

“The word terrorism is never used when a story on Sangh violence is told, no matter how large-scale the violence is. The violence unleashed by the Sangh Parivar in Gujarat was defined only as expression of communalism and the same is case with what happens in Orissa at the moment.”

While the IM surfaced less than a year ago, its members are hardly new to the terror game, say intelligence officials. “The IM is simply a front for the hard-line faction of SIMI. It is just old wine in a newly labeled bottle,” the IB official said.

The IM has emerged from a rift in SIMI between hardliners, keen to wage war against the Indian state, and moderates. While its increasing radicalism can be traced back to the destruction of a 16th century mosque by Hindu extremists in the early 1990s, the IM faction emerged only in 2005. But since then its members have been trained in bomb-making and explosives techniques in various camps around the country.

According to the IB official, while IM’s ties with SIMI “have been evident for a while – the close links were underscored further during interrogations of detained SIMI and IM members”. The IM had demanded the release of SIMI activists held on terrorism charges in the e-mail preceding the Ahmedabad blasts.

The IM’s masterminds include many SIMI hard-line stalwarts, like SIMI general secretary Safdar Nagori. Now in jail, Nagori is said to be “the architect of SIMI’s transformation to IM, its shift to all-out terrorism and war against the Indian state”.

Abdus Subhan Qureshi alias Tauqeer, an expert hacker, worked for a major software firm in Mumbai before he joined SIMI and jihad activity. He is now on the run, wanted for masterminding the Delhi blasts and his role in several other attacks over recent years. “IM’s emerging leaders are all ‘graduates’ from its terror training camps,” the IB official said.

Police claim to have arrested several IM “masterminds” in recent weeks, with two suspected IM terrorists gunned down in a firefight with police in Delhi, and police telling the media of, “major successes in busting IM’s terror modules”.

However, in private they are not so confident. A senior police official admitted to Asia Times Online that what investigating agencies know about the IM could well be just “the tip of the iceberg”, meaning the battle against the IM has only just begun.

It is not the size of the IM or its possible number of supporters that makes the outfit difficult to tackle, but rather the flawed approach of police and investigating agencies, which is only fueling further anger among Muslims towards the Indian state.

Civil society activists have been drawing attention to the harassment and random arrests of Muslim youth following the Delhi blasts, and claim the police version of the encounter in Delhi where two IM “terrorists” were killed is “riddled with holes”.

The competition among various police agencies to claim credit for arresting terrorists and masterminds is resulting in the targeting of innocent Muslim youth, said a recent report written by a fact-finding team of lawyers, academicians and civil rights campaigners.

“This must stop immediately. It appears that after making SIMI the scapegoat, the police has now shifted focus to Azamgarh [a town in Uttar Pradesh from where most of those arrested in connection with the Delhi blasts hail] which is being dubbed the nursery of terrorism.”

This groups adds that targeting young Muslim boys from Azamgarh or those who may have been members of SIMI in the past has led to an enormous sense of insecurity, fear and resentment in the Muslim community.

Terrorism is bound to be an important issue in upcoming parliamentary and state assembly elections, and the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is already criticizing the ruling United Progressive Alliance (UPA) for being “soft on terrorism”. Having to defend its rather shabby performance in preventing terrorist attacks in the country, the Congress party is attempting to adopt a tougher position.

The UPA, which scrapped the Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) passed by the BJP-led NDA government in 2002 on the grounds that the anti-terrorism legislation claiming it was anti-minority and had not worked, is in a bind.

It does not want to be seen to be as “soft on terrorism”, hence its growing demands for new anti-terrorism legislation, and claims that inaction will undermine the party’s support among urban Indians. But then there is also the Muslim vote, which is important not only for the Congress but for some of its allies in the UPA.

Anxious to be seen to be tough in tacking terrorism, police and politicians have been providing detailed press conferences on blast investigations, interrogations of those in custody and encounters with “terrorists” – but intelligence officials complain this is undermining investigations.

As the government looks for new ways to appear tough on terror, it is rapidly alienating the Muslim community as its targets hundreds of Muslim youths who migrated to the cities for study and work. These youths are now said to be streaming back their villages angry and disillusioned, with only the IM set to gain.

India fears the dawn of Hindutva terror

By M H Ahssan

Hindus linked to militant extremist groups have recently been arrested for plotting terror crimes targeted at Muslims – an as-yet unexplained, and perhaps unprecedented, incident in post-independence India.

Hindu radicalism and ultra-nationalist extremism are nothing new to Indian politics, but such right-wing activism has now taken a turn for the dangerous. Across India there is talk of the emergence of “Hindu terrorism” – specifically, a pan-India militant Hindu network set on avenging Islamic fundamentalism and jihadi terrorist attacks.

Contrary to usual assertions by Indian security agencies – that Muslim outfits are behind most terrorist strikes – it has emerged that recent bomb blasts in India are likely the handiwork of anti-Muslim “Hindutva” groups bent on violent revenge.

These findings have shed a disturbing light on the fatal attacks on Indian Muslim worshippers and mosques over the past few years.

The word “Hindutva” has been coined for those who believe that India should follow laws and principles of the majority Hindu faith. So far, the most virulent form of Hindutva was unleashed in the state of Gujarat, where the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief minister Narender Modi backed deadly attacks on Muslims by Hindu rioters in which thousands died. The BJP has long been considered sympathetic to ultra-Hindu sentiment.

The new twist to the allegedly Hindu-linked terror attacks has come with last week’s arrests of Hindu activists, including women, on charges of plotting to bomb and kill Muslims in at least two Indian states.

The police have arrested 36-year-old Pragya Singh Thakur, a sadhvi (ascetic) known to be closely associated with radical Hindu groups, along with two male counterparts, on charges of orchestrating powerful bomb blasts in Malegaon, in the western state of Maharashtra, and Modasa town in Gujarat.

Both attacks were directed at Muslim gatherings during the holy month of Ramadan (September). Five people were killed in Malegaon and one died in Modasa. The result has been simmering Hindu-Muslim communal tensions.

Pragya was detained in Indore, in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, and is now being interrogated. Pragya’s father, Chandraprakash Thakur, admitted his shame. “If she is sentenced to life imprisonment, I will neither be happy nor sad,” he was quoted as saying.

Maharashtra’s anti-terrorism squad has also detained five other Hindus, including four men and a woman. The men include three retired army soldiers, including one major. At least one was reportedly trained as a bomb-maker, suggesting a further link between terrorism and ex-servicemen.

Pragya and the rest are reportedly associated with radical Hindu outfits – Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), Bajrang Dal and the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh – that keep close connections with the BJP.

Investigations by Mumbai police have also raised suspicions about several Hindu radical groups’ involvement in blasts in Thane, in Maharashtra state, and orchestrating riots.

Senior security officials have confirmed to Asia Times Online that given the spate of recent terror attacks, there has been a concerted effort by agencies across the country to crack down on terror elements, irrespective of religion.

Coordinated phone-tapping, an exchange of ground-level information and the cultivation of new informers is yielding results, according to reports. Recently, Delhi police apprehended a Muslim youth suspected of being involved in the September bomb attacks in the capital.

A series of recent bombings in cities across India, including Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad and Varanasi have killed and maimed thousands.

India is in the midst of an ugly phase of terror attacks in which soft targets such as crowded markets have been chosen for killing civilians.

There is also evidence that the latest Islamic terror cells are increasingly homegrown. This is due to increased security forces along India’s borders with Pakistan; infiltration is down and cross-border terrorist activity has been effectively reduced.

This has led to a rise of India’s own militant Muslim groups, many of which operate under the umbrella of an outfit called the Indian Mujahideen.

Militancy is also nothing new to India. Indian freedom fighters such as Bhagat Singh and Chadrashekar Azad led daring attacks on British rulers in pre-1947 colonial India. In the 1980s and 1990s, India grappled with Sikh militancy. There are also longstanding Hindu extremist outfits, such as the Ranvir Sena in Bihar, but they generally fight in caste-driven conflicts usually related to property disputes.

Maoists attacks, especially in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh, are also related to alleged oppression by higher castes and exploitation by landlords.

Right-wing Hindu outfits usually make the news for their strong-arm tactics against trends they consider to be un-Indian culture or in deference to the West. In the past, these acts have included punishing couples caught in public and cracking down on Valentine’s Day celebrations and women adorned in revealing clothes.

Additionally, Hindu extremists have attacked cinemas featuring movies perceived to be too sexually explicit and have destroyed works by artists such as M F Hussain which the groups claim insult Hindu sentiments.

Recent bomb attacks against Muslims are a totally different matter – the result of deep-seated angst and militant philosophy. Further investigations into attacks on the Jama Masjid (mosque) in Delhi, as well as on Muslim worshippers in Hyderabad and the India-Pakistan “peace train”, the Samjahauta Express, may provide more clues as to the motivation to target Muslims.

The Indian government has been rattled by the latest revelations, and leading political parties the BJP and Congress have sought to use the situation to their advantage.

Provincial elections are due in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Delhi in November. In each of these important electorates, the BJP and Congress are in a head-to-head battle that will set the tone for national elections next summer.

The BJP has been on the back foot, caught between its pro-Hindutva strategy and condemning terrorist violence.

“A terrorist is a terrorist irrespective of his religion or caste. The BJP objects to the term ‘Hindu terrorists’. By condemning the majority, one seeks to gain the minority vote,” said BJP vice president Yashwant Sinha.

According to a statement released by the VHP, “We see the government’s hand behind this. No one uses the word ‘Islamic terrorism’. This is vote-bank politics, meant to appease Muslims.”

The Congress, meanwhile, sees the turmoil as an opportunity to win Muslim votes.

“I ask the BJP leadership to come clean on their links with these outfits and their activities,” said Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh. “[The] Malegaon and Modasa blasts are just one example. Members of Hindu fundamentalist outfits have been making bombs in Kanpur. Indore has become the epicenter of Hindu terror. Investigations into the Samjhauta blast also revealed bombs from Indore.”

Mudslinging aside, the stark reality is that terrorism in India is spreading across communal and religious lines. This trend does not auger well.

Faith in India’s army shaken by blasts

By M H Ahssan

Investigations into recent bomb blasts in India have led to the arrest of several Hindus and for the first time ever, a serving officer of the Indian army.

The arrests have triggered heated debate on whether the arrests indicate the existence of “Hindu terrorism”. More worryingly, the probes point to the possibility of the hitherto secular and apolitical Indian army being infected by the communal virus.

Six people were killed and over 80 injured in blasts on September 29 in the Muslim-dominated town of Malegaon, about 260 kilometers from Mumbai. A few hours later, a bomb went off near a mosque in Modasa town in Gujarat, where Muslims were offering special Ramadan prayers, killing two people.

Investigations have led to the arrest of about 10 people, including Ajay Rahirkar, Sameer Kulkarni, Rakesh Dhawade (all members of the Hindu extremist organization, the Abhinav Bharat), Dayanand Pandey (a self-styled Hindu “guru”) Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur (an “ascetic” who is a member of the Durga Vahini – the women’s wing of the Vishva Hindu Parishad – and the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad – the students’ wing of the Bharatiya Janata Party – BJP).

These were not members of fringe, underground outfits but people with links to the BJP and its fraternal organizations. Thakur, for instance, is known to be close to BJP president Rajnath Singh and Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan. There are photographs of her with these BJP bigwigs. Investigations are revealing that their activities might have been funded by business houses as well.

Neither Hindu extremism nor the involvement of Sangh Parivar (a group of organizations that espouse Hindutva or Hindu supremacy) activists in acts of terrorism is news. Activists of Bajrang Dal and the VHP have engaged in attacks in the past that should have been described as terrorism. They were not. On several occasions in the past couple of years when bombs went off in mosques and Muslim-dominated areas, in shrines and trains, the needle of suspicion did point in the direction of Hindu terror outfits. But investigations into these blasts never led to the arrest of Hindus.

That has now changed with the investigations into the Malegaon blasts. The hand of Hindu right-wing organizations in terrorist attacks in India has now been laid bare.

But even as Indians are heatedly debating whether “Hindu terrorism” exists, another worrying issue has been thrown up by the investigations. Three men arrested in connection with the Malegaon blasts are from the armed forces. They include one serving officer, Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Shrikant Purohit, and two retired officers, Major Ramesh Upadhyay and Colonel Shailesh Raikar.

Thirty-eight-year-old Purohit has the dubious distinction of being the first serving officer of the Indian army to be arrested in connection with a terrorist attack. He has been described as the “mastermind” of the Malegaon blasts. He allegedly procured the explosives (he is said to have provided RDX from the army depot) and funding for the blasts, provided training and co-ordinated the blasts. He is said to have arranged for fake military ID cards providing access for Abhinav Bharat activists to army bases. Purohit is said to have worked several stints in military intelligence. His role in several other terrorist attacks over the past few years, including the February 2007 bombing of the Samjhauta Express or Friendship Train linking Delhi with Lahore in Pakistan, is now under the scanner.

Upadhyay, the head of the Abhinav Bharat’s political wing, was Purohit’s link with the organization. He is said to have provided training in bomb-making to the blast suspects. As for Raikar, he is said to have allowed the Abhinav Bharat and other Hindu extremist groups to hold training camps on the campus of the Bhonsala Military School in Nashik of which he was commandant.
Reports in the media suggest that more serving military officers could be detained in the coming days. A senior officer is believed to have had prior knowledge of the Malegaon blasts.

The arrest of serving and retired army officers in connection with terrorist attacks has triggered a spate of worrying questions. Have Hindu supremacist and extremist ideologies penetrated the hitherto secular Indian army? Are Purohit and others an aberration or do they point to a growing trend in the Indian armed forces?

Serving and retired army officers – irrespective of their religious backgrounds – fiercely defend the army’s secular credentials. “There is no communalism in the army. In my 37 to 38 years of service, I came across just one or two odd individuals who had a communal mindset,” retired Major General Afsir Karim recalled in a recent interview. He drew attention to the fact that Indian army regiments are organized along ethnic lines not based on religion and that in the army you are identified by the regiment to which you belong. “Who are you? I will say I am Kumaon. That’s the ethos that prevails in army, even now,” he said.

“The terrorism-related activities of three army men cannot be taken to be reflective of the entire armed forces or even of a sizeable section,” a serving officer in the Northern Command told Asia Times Online. “Soldiers do practice their faith and visit places of worship but their faith is their personal business. The army allows practice of religion but discourages communal sentiments,” he said.

This view is echoed by Maroof Raza, an ex-army officer. While the officers’ corps has become more representative of the middle class and therefore more “easily influenced by hardline religious propagandists, right-wing sentiments are certainly never aired,” he writes in the newsmagazine Outlook. “Those that fall prey to propaganda of the Sangh Parivar and its jingoistic outfits are still … few and far between in our uniformed forces. … To paint, therefore, the entire olive green force with a saffron [the color of the Hindu right-wing organizations] brush is rather unfair.”

Indeed, the actions of a fringe should not be seen to be reflective of the institution itself. The army has a long and proud tradition of being a secular and apolitical force. Unlike other armed forces in the region, it has stayed away from assuming a political role and its soldiers are known for their professionalism. And unlike the country’s police, who are known to have supported the majority Hindus in communal riot situations, the armed forces have always acted as a neutral force, especially in communally polarized situations. Could the presence of officers with links to Hindu extremist outfits – however few these might be – change this?

There have been instances in the past when soldiers reacted to issues as members of their religious community rather than as Indians. The army’s storming of the Golden Temple in Amritsar in 1984 to flush the Sikh holy shrine of terrorists who had set up base there triggered an angry response from a section of Sikh soldiers in the army. Their religious sentiments hurt by the army’s destruction of their shrine, some of them mutinied. Some are even said to have joined the ranks of the Sikh militants. But even that serious breakdown of discipline did not have long-term implications for the armed forces.

That seems to have changed in the 1990s. That was the decade which saw India plunged into serious communal polarization, riots and terrorist violence. That was also the decade that saw a spectacular rise in the political fortunes of the BJP. There are any number of examples from the 1998 to 2004 period (when the BJP led the coalition government) of the army being involved in the BJP’s political/religious activity. A report in the Outlook points out that in 1999, for instance, the 3rd Division of the army “worked overtime to facilitate the Sindhu yatra, an event that was planned and executed by the Dharma Yatra Sangh, an arm of the VHP”.

Not only did the BJP draw the armed forces into its politico-religious activities, but in the years since several retired officers have joined the BJP. The presence of ex-army officers in extremist outfits linked to this party was to be expected.

But what of serving army officers? Armed forces the world over are conservative institutions. Their personnel are drawn to right-wing ideas, however apolitical the army as an institution might be. In India, the BJP’s “muscular approach” strikes a chord among a section of the soldiers. The communal and hate politics practiced by politicians in India was bound to have its impact on at least a few soldiers. To expect the armed forces to remain completely impervious to the virus of communal politics is rather unrealistic.

Investigations into the Malegaon blasts have revealed the involvement of a handful of serving and former army officers. But to brush this aside as an aberration would be a blunder.

Criticism of the armed forces’ violation of human rights in insurgency-wridden areas and of their corruption has often been frowned on in the country. “It will weaken the morale of the armed forces,” is a cry that is raised to silence criticism. In the process, rot has been allowed to set in.

The investigations into the Malegaon blasts reveal that the armed forces are vulnerable to communal and extremist ideologies. To ignore this would be disastrous not just for the armed forces but also for India as a secular democracy.

Closing time for India’s Iranian cafes

By M H Ahssan

As India and Iran struggle over recent oil and nuclear power squabbles, a quaintly delicious cultural link between the two ancient civilizations is also fighting for survival, with the famously cranky Iranian cafes sliding into extinction in Mumbai.

Iranian cafes are century-old landmarks in India’s financial capital and perhaps Asia’s oldest surviving genre of restaurants. Their bun maska (crusty buns split and spread with butter), kari (fluffy) biscuits, custard pies, puddings and paani kum chai (thick milky tea) are as much part of cosmopolitan Mumbai as cheesecakes in New York or croissants on the sidewalk cafes in Paris.

Iranian cafes appeared in Mumbai and Karachi (now in Pakistan) after their Zoroastrian-Iranian owners came to India in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They followed earlier settlers from Persia, followers of the Prophet Zoroaster (628 BC-551 BC), also called Zarathushtra. The surviving Parsi community in India is hailed as the world’s last bastion of the ancient Iranian-Zoroastrian religion.

From an estimated 350 Iranian restaurants in the 1950s, barely 25 survived into the year 2008. Landmarks such as Cafe Darayush, Cafe De La Paix (modeled after the original that opened in 1862 at Place del’Opera in Paris), Original Persian Restaurant and Kyani were popular hangouts for journalists, stockbrokers, tourists, college students and young couples dating back to English colonial times.

With their distinct and sombre decor, the most famous Iranian cafe contribution to Indian urban folklore was their stern admonishments to patrons – the kind unlikely to be found in any restaurant in the world. Iranian cafes generally place trademark notices of dire warnings to customers. Among the classics:

Food will not be served to over drunken persons

Do not sit for too long

Do not argue with waiters

Do not wash hands on plates

Those misbehaving with customers and waiters will be handed over to police.

In delicious irony – and starkly standing out against current Iranian-Israeli enmity – Jewish-Indian poet Nizzim Ezekiel (1924-2004), immortalized India’s Iranian restaurants in a 1972 poem called Irani Restaurant Instructions.

Please
Do not spit
Do not sit more
Pay promptly, time is valuable
Do not write letter
without order refreshment
Do not comb,
hair is spoiling floor
Do not make mischief in cabin
our waiter is watching
Come again
All are welcome whatever caste
If not satisfied tell us
otherwise tell others
God Is Great.

But these amusingly solemn shrines to yesteryear are losing out to real estate sharks, burger chains, pizza parlors and the like. Inheritance squabbles are rife between Iranian owners and an educated younger generation disinterested in running a low-cost tea shop.

More poignantly, the extinction of Iranian cafes parallels the threat to the entire Parsi community, which now has barely 70,000 survivors living in Mumbai.

The Parsis, among India’s tiniest ethnic minorities, have disproportionately contributed some of India’s most dazzling success stories. Ratan Tata, for example, is chairman of Tatas, one of Asia’s largest corporate houses. His predecessor, JRD Tata, founded the India’s civil aviation industry, and the late Sam Maneckshaw was India’s first field marshal and chief of staff. Zubin Mehta was once conductor of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra and is now lifetime conductor of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. And not to forget the late Freddie Mercury, born Farrokh Bulsara, the legendary lead singer of the rock band Queen.

Historians say that the early Iranian migrants, largely from rural Iran, worked in the homes of Parsis who were among the upper social strata of migrants from Iran. The workers gathered in evenings to swap stories about their homeland. At such homesick gatherings, many served tea for a small fee. Thus was born, says Mumbai urban legend, the Iranian cafe.

One Iranian cafe survivor, the Army Restaurant and Cafe, near the international tourist hotspot Colaba, was in a breakfast buzz when this correspondent dropped by on a recent Saturday morning. Ali Mohammad, an archetypal Iranian restaurant manager, was hollering injunctions – punctuated with lurid curses – to the kitchen to deliver the trademark paani kum tea (less water, more milk version). “Since 1936″, he explains, “the British army stayed in the building and that’s how we got the name Army Restaurant.”

According to Mohammed, a major threat to his restaurant is the squabbles between descendants of the original owners over lucrative multi-million dollar property deals involving inherited Iranian cafes that now occupy prime real estate.

In July 1999, a dispute among partners killed one of Mumbai’s most famous landmarks, Cafe Naaz, the Iranian restaurant atop the elite residential area of Malabar Hill. The six disputing partners failed to renew the municipality license and Mumbai – particularly its young couples – lost a cozy open-air restaurant with a view of the city lights below and starry skies above.

Some remaining Iranian cafes, such as Cafe Mundegar and the more internationally famous Leopold Cafe in Colaba, transformed themselves into airy pubs that are now favorite watering holes for Western tourists in Mumbai. As with classic Iranian cafe tradition, the restaurants occupy the corner of a building and have two entrances: one never bumps into an entering or exiting customer.

The classic versions still remain, like the century-old Yazdani Bakery on Cawasji Patel Street, near the grand Parsi Fire Temple. Yazdani, in the 1940s, was one of Asia’s most famous bakeries, with wedding cakes said to be exported to Japan.

Sadly, Iranian restaurants face similar problems across the Pakistan border in Karachi. Seventy percent of the over 100 Iranian cafes open during the 1960s have now closed their doors, estimated the leading local daily newspaper Jung. Indian-Persian culinary links to an ancient shared culture – such as Cafe Jehangir, Cafe Darakshan, Cafe Pehlvi and Cafe India – have disappeared or are disappearing in the southern port city of Karachi, swallowed by the inescapable truth that everything must change, and nothing lasts forever.

The vanishing Iranian restaurants leave behind poignant reminders, both to newly arrived tourists and to those who from childhood have eagerly dunked bun maska in Iranian tea.

“If asked to quickly pick three random images from my consciousness to define this city [Mumbai], I’d pick the Iranian cafes, the Fiat taxi and the Stock Exchange Building – in that order,” wrote leading film animator Gautam Benegal in the blog “Irani Chai Mumbai”. “And if anything symbolizes the cosmopolitan nature of this city, it is the corner Iranian [cafe].”

Mumbai’s cosmopolitan texture, so aptly represented by the endangered Iranian cafes, is also under threat. Regional chauvinism has in recent weeks sparked violent attacks on north Indian immigrants to Mumbai. Political goons have also vandalized the city’s black Fiat taxis, owned largely by immigrant north Indians from Uttar Pradesh state.

Like its quaint old Iranian cafes, the status of Mumbai as a worldly financial capital of Asia and sister city of New York is also under threat.

Mumbai’s night of terror

By M H Ahssan

The unprecedented night of horror in India’s financial capital began at about 9.30 pm for two Germans, Rita and Thomas, part of a Lufthansa in-flight crew finishing dinner at Leopold Cafe in Colaba in south Mumbai.

Barely five hours earlier, HNN published an news article (Closing time for India’s Iranian cafes) mentioning the restaurant as a favorite of Western tourists, and this popularity caused it to be among the first of 12 terrorist targets on Wednesday night that killed more than 80 people and injured nearly 300, and the figures are rising.

Apart from the cafe, groups of militants armed with automatic weapons and grenades burst into luxury hotels, a hospital and a railway station, spewing death. As of publication time, many tourists were being held hostage in the Taj Mahal hotel, a 105-year-old landmark, and the five-star Trident Oberoi.

“I saw the terrorist firing his machine gun at people sitting at the next table,” Rita said, “and then thought the gun would turn around to me.” But the terrorist, in his mid-30s, swung the gun away from her, momentarily distracted by his accomplice waiting in the mezzanine floor and firing randomly at diners.

Her life had been saved in that split second. Police said they had killed four gunmen and arrested nine. A group identifying itself as the Deccan Mujahideen said it was responsible, per emails sent to news organizations. Virtually nothing is known of this group. “Deccan” is an area of India and “Mujahideen” is the plural form of a Muslim participating in jihad. Security officials believe it unlikely an unknown group could carry out such a precise and heavily-armed attack.

It is more likely to be the work of the Indian Mujahideen, an Islamist group that has claimed responsibility for other attacks in India. On Thursday morning, speaking from inside the Oberoi where foreigners are being held hostage, a man identified as Sahadullah told India TV he belonged to an Indian Islamist group seeking to end the persecution of Indian Muslims: “We want all mujahideens held in India released and only after that we will release the people.”

No one knows how the terrorists arrived in the city. One theory is that they came from the sea in an explosives-laden boat. But there is no doubt about their agenda.

Rita, Thomas and Jesper, the latter the owner of a shipping company from Denmark, fell to the floor with other diners at the Leopold, some on top of each other. “We thought if we lay down and kept still, the gunman would think we are dead,” said Rita, a blonde stewardess serving on Lufthansa Flight 764 from Mumbai to Munich.

As the machinegun-wielding murderer ran up to join his accomplice upstairs, the trio fled into an already panic-stricken street, over a dead body and leaving their bags, money, cell phones and unpaid dinner bill behind. But the night of terror for Rita and her friends was only beginning, as it was for a city of 13 million not unused to terrorist strikes but never in such prolonged horror.

The trio were staying at the Oberoi Hotel in Nariman Point, a rare case of victims caught in two of the dozen terrorist-hit areas in Mumbai on the fateful night. Hemant Karkare, chief of the city’s anti-terrorism squad, was among three senior police officials killed in a police counter-attack against the terrorists holding hostages as the Oberoi and Taj Mahal. By 10.30pm outside the Oberoi, by the Arabian Sea on Marine Drive, it was surreally quiet, with roads dark and deserted, in contrast to the usual daytime office bustle in one of the city’s busiest and most expensive office areas.

I reached the Oberoi minutes after seeing the news flash on TV, even as gunmen were holed up inside the hotel and police cordons were being thrown around the white-painted building. I recalled the Marriott in Islamabad, which terrorists struck on September 20, setting it alight. Would the Oberoi and Taj suffer the same devastating fate? No one nearby, including police constables, had any clear idea of what was happening, except that gun shots had been fired and there were multiple explosions.

Small groups of bystanders joined fleeing uniformed hotel staff running into the night. Sporadic gunfire and explosions could be heard from the Taj Mahal about two kilometers away. Oberoi hotel guests periodically raced out, crouching and escorted by poorly armed policemen. Sunil (name changed on request), a Marine Commando Special Forces Officer, residing nearby, had heard the first explosion outside the Oberoi.

An explosives specialist, Sunil said that he gauged by the sound that it involved low-grade explosives of about 10 kilograms, of the kind that can be packed into a fire extinguisher and set off with a mobile phone ring as a trigger.

Other explosions were grenade attacks, the first of many across Mumbai. “The explosion in the Air India building in the 1993 bomb blast attacks was so loud the ground shook,” remembers officer Sunil. “First you feel the building shake and then you hear the loud explosion.”

At this point security men asked us to move away from the area, particularly since I was wearing a white shirt and could be a sitting target at night for bullets.

It was a terrible feeling of deja vu for officer Sunil, who, like me, had similarly raced out into the streets in Churchgate on midday on Friday, March 12, 1993, to see a sea of glass shards amid dead, bleeding and dying bodies strewn around the Air India building, just a stone’s throw the Oberoi. In that incident, a series of 13 blasts killed up to 250 people, with 700 injured. Fifteen years later, Mumbai has suffered more serial terrorist strikes. In the intervening years, the city has been the victim of bomb attacks, but it has never seen anything like the carnage of Wednesday night – it was pure and simple urban warfare.

Mumbai has been attacked six times since 1993. The last major attack was in in 2006 when 200 people were killed in attacks on the rail transit system.

“This is a high-risk zone,” said officer Sunil. “There could be delayed explosions.” His prediction was correct; within 30 minutes, with gunfire and explosions had turned Mumbai into Baghdad.

A black-suited Oberoi banquet manager was standing in a dark, nearly deserted lane opposite the outwardly silent hotel, staring up at the few lighted room windows. His hotel would be nearly empty of guests by the morning.

The still surreal silence was broken occasionally by a rush of feet fleeing the hotel, or policemen crouching into firing positions near the hotel’s perimeter, or warning onlookers to go away. “Fortunately, we had only one function tonight, in one banquet room out of the nine we have,” the banquet manager said. “Otherwise, the causalities might have been higher.” He said the hotel had about 45% occupancy.

“Two masked armed gunmen randomly fired from the ramp in the lobby,” the Oberoi shopping mall manager standing nearby reported on his cell phone to a senior. “The Kandahar [restaurant[ is badly damaged, sir. No word of causalities.” A pattern was emerging. Two-member teams of gunmen had fanned out across Mumbai, randomly firing into crowds and hurling grenades out of backpacks.

Most of the targets were tourist-oriented, including railway stations and hospitals. Reports emerged of terrorists looking in particular for American and British guests at the Oberoi and Taj Mahal, two luxury landmarks and rated by Forbes and Conde Nast among the world’s best business hotels. In a sense, Mumbai and India’s economy was under attack.

A young food and beverage trainee attending a roof-top party at the Oberoi had just escaped into the street, still panting, and reported seeing a Japanese guest shot in the hip. “Another guest said he had seen a man being shot dead before his eyes,” he said. “We heard there is another explosion in Mazgaon Docks. We live near there and have to go.”

By 11.30 pm, when I met Thomas, Rita and Jesper near the Air India building facing the Arabian Sea, Marine Drive had turned into a Hollywood disaster movie set: ambulances, police vehicles, satellite TV vans, trucks of heavily armed soldiers rumbling into the zone and reporters screaming into their cell phones. Thomas and Rita were desperately trying to contact three missing crew members, not yet sure whether one of them had escaped alive out of the Leopold Cafe.

Soldiers were moving into the Oberoi, seven grenade explosions rocked the Taj Mahal, India’s first-ever five-star hotel, with its famous sea-facing dome on fire. Like other hotel guests, the Lufthansa crew were stranded outside for the night. Shipping company owner Jesper had experienced bullets flying near his head when he served as solder in a United Nations peacekeeping mission in Yugoslavia 13 years ago.

“We were caught in the crossfire between Bosnians and Serbs,” Jesper remembered. “But tonight was more terrifying because I had no gun to defend myself. Soldiers firing on soldiers in a war is easier to understand than civilians firing at other civilians.” “This is my first visit to Mumbai and I like it,” said Rita, who nearly lost her life in the Leopold Cafe and escaped being killed in the Oberoi in a night of terror that she and Mumbai will never forget. “But I don’t want to come back here again.”

Lufthansa eventually picked up Rita, Thomas and Jesper in the morning and moved them to the Hyatt Residency near the airport. Flights out of Mumbai were expected to be full on Thursday. But Mumbai has so far refused to heed chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh’s advice to stay indoors. Office attendance is expected to be down, but suburban trains are running and the city is attempting to come out to work. For stoic, terrorist-battered Mumbai, work and life go on.

Mumbai terror attacks

By M H Ahssan

Mumbai has experienced terror attacks earlier. In March 1993, simultaneous attacks on a number of targets resulted in over 270 fatal casualties. Their origin was traced to Dawood Ibrahim and his associates who were based in Karachi. The multiple bomb blasts on Mumbai trains killed 200 people in July 2005.

Once again the investigations led to a link between those who carried out the blasts and Pakistan. The present batch of terrorists is reported to have landed close to the Gateway of India in rubber dinghies. The equipment, training and sophistication of their planning and the identity of a suspect arrested in Chowpatty would tend to indicate a Pakistani link.

Unlike in previous attacks when the casualties were all Indians, this time there are foreigners among the dead. There are also reports that the terrorists were particularly interested in US, UK and Israeli passport holders.

While an organisation called ‘Deccan Mujahideen’ has claimed responsibility the Indian agencies do not consider this a genuine claim; they feel that this is a Pakistani jihadi operation.

Since a few terrorists have been captured, their identities would surely be revealed in the next few days. The Mumbai police believe that the sophistication and skill of the terrorists would tend to indicate that they were not locals. It appears that a mother ship had dropped dinghies close to Mumbai. The Indian Navy has intercepted a vessel from Pakistan believed to have been the mother ship. Though in the 1993 operations the explosives came via sea the people who placed the explosives were from Mumbai. In this case, the terrorists landed on the Mumbai waterfront. Though sea-based terrorist attacks have been talked about, presumably those in charge had not paid adequate attention to it.

The counterterrorism efforts in India are fragmented among the state and central agencies. Efforts to have an integrated central agency to deal with terrorism have so far been thwarted by political parties who tend to place their own parochial interests higher than national interests. In the US, where they had a number of federal agencies dealing with different aspects of intelligence in the wake of 9/11 they found that there was inadequate coordination among them.

Hence, there was a failure to assess the 9/11 threat though there were bits of information. Subsequently, a new post of director of national intelligence was created to supervise and coordinate all intelligence agencies. In the biggest bureaucratic reshuffle in US history the department of homeland security was also created with bipartisan support. The terrorist threat India faces is far more severe than the one faced by the US separated from Europe and Asia by two oceans and having friendly neighbours in Mexico and Canada.

India has three unfriendly porous borders and nearly three decades of terrorism and proxy war directed against it. Yet our political parties are not sensitive enough to appreciate the need for intelligence coordination and an integrated internal security structure. Recently the Pakistani government stripped the ISI of its responsibility for political intelligence. Pakistan had to seek a multi-billion-dollar loan package from the IMF and the loan has been sanctioned with conditionalities.

Many in Pakistan have openly resented president-elect Barack Obama’s friendliness towards India. The recent friendly remarks of Pakistani president Asif Zardari towards India have also not found approval among sections of the Pakistani establishment. A section of the Pakistani establishment and the ISI have been attempting to bleed India through a thousand cuts.

The ISI was known to create problems for its own government to advance its interests. Therefore, the possibility of rogue elements in ISI and jihadi elements in Pakistan conspiring to create tensions between New Delhi and Islamabad cannot be ruled out. This would keep ISI’s pre-eminence in Pakistan’s India policy and help it to argue with Washington that increased tension with India rules out Islamabad playing a more effective role on its western front.

The terror attack on Mumbai was aimed at hitting tourist traffic and its commercial relations with the US and other developed countries. It was also intended to club India with the Crusaders (the US and the West) and Zionists (the Israelis). This may look like an act of desperation by the jihadis and their friends in the ISI and Pakistani establishment. In a sense, the jihadis may be attempting to bring the clash of civilisations thesis to its denouement. One should not forget the original ‘clash of civilisations’ thesis was the two-nation theory which the Indian Muslims repudiated by choosing to stay on in India.

The present acts of terrorism is an attempt by the advocates of this thesis to create tension between the two communities in this country. Till now the US and other western nations were not adequately sensitive to terrorism perpetrated against India. This was partly because the casualties were all Indians. This time it is different.

While all evidence points to the involvement of Pakistani elements in the terror acts, New Delhi should at the same time be careful not to walk into the trap of creating major Indo-Pakistan tensions as a new president takes over in Washington and with India facing a general election in the next few months. The country expects the two national parties to get together to formulate a joint strategy to thwart the jihadi attempt to create a ‘clash of civilisations’ in this country.

INDIA is under attack

By M H Ahssan

This nation is under attack. The scale, intensity and level of orchestration of terror attacks in Mumbai put one thing beyond doubt: India is effectively at war and it has deadly enemies in its midst. Ten places in south Mumbai were struck in quick succession.

As in the case of the demolition of New York’s World Trade Center in 2001, Mumbai’s iconic monuments such as the Taj Mahal Hotel, the Oberoi Trident and Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus have come under attack. The number of people killed in multiple attacks is 101 and counting, which includes foreigners and senior policemen. At least 300 have been injured.

The terrorists who carried out the attacks are well supplied, armed to the teeth and extremely well motivated. The question now is whether the nation can show any serious degree of resolve and coordination in confronting terror. This war can be won, but it will require something from the political class, from security forces and from ordinary people. It’s time now to move beyond pointing fingers at one another or resorting to cliches such as ‘resilient Mumbai’. It’s also time to end the habit of basing one’s stand on terrorism on the particular religious affiliation of terrorists, criticising or exonerating them using their religion a point of reference. Terrorists have no religion. Political bickering on this issue is divisive; what India needs now is unity.

While Mumbai also witnessed multiple attacks which brought the city to a halt in 1993, this one is different in two respects. One, it is unfolding in slow motion with the world media as witness, which makes for maximum psychological impact. Two, foreigners have specifically been targeted. Sites frequented by them have been chosen for attack and Britons, Americans and Israelis appear to have been singled out.

This kind of attack on India’s financial capital is intended to send the message that India isn’t a safe place to do business. The Indian economy and its links with the world are under attack. On the plus side, there have been unprecedented outpourings of sympathy and offers of cooperation from world governments. All the more reason to make the attacks on Mumbai a transformative moment. There has been talk of beefing up India’s poor infrastructure. Security must now be seen as an essential element of infrastructure, as vital as power, water or transport.

Both L K Advani and Rajnath Singh have said it’s time to rise above politics, which is welcome. An announced joint visit to Mumbai by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and leader of the opposition Advani would send a signal of political unity. Beyond that the PM, in consultation with senior opposition leaders, must draw up a consensus plan about how to deal with contingency situations as well as upgrade India’s security culture.

A host of institutions have been built since the 1980s when India first encountered terrorism. New agencies, special cells and commando units have come up since then. But how well do we run them, how well resourced are they and is there proper coordination among them to maximise and collate information? According to the home ministry, terrorists sneaked in from the Arabian Sea. They may have sailed past the naval headquarters to blast their way into the city. However, it took a while before the National Security Guards and naval commandos in the city were pressed into action. What explains such delay? Was it a multiplicity of commands or plain bureaucratic lethargy? The point is even in circumstances when personnel and infrastructure are available, planning and execution are shockingly poor.

Constitutional experts must put their hands together to see whether under existing laws any special, but temporary, powers can be given to the security agencies. All major political parties should be taken into confidence to see what urgent steps can be taken to prevent the nation from sinking deeper into chaos. There is a pressing need to restructure India’s security architecture. A federal agency to deal with terrorism has been suggested by this newspaper and now by the PM. A coordinated effort to process information gleaned by state and central agencies should help to transform randomly collected information into actionable intelligence.

The government should immediately work on an internal security doctrine that demarcates the role of various security wings and a clear command structure to deal with terrorism. This should include contingency plans for various scenarios which lay out in advance how to respond to them. Tougher laws, in consultation with the opposition, may also be needed to control terror.

It’s incumbent on all chief ministers to remain on alert and maintain calm in their states. Unnecessary repercussions from the Mumbai incidents need to be avoided at all costs. Election campaigning needs to be kept at a minimum to avoid stretching security too thin. The political class must ensure that communalism of all varieties is kept out of politics.

Besides terrorists coming in from the Arabian Sea, their looking for Americans, Britons and Israelis give the signal that the attack on Mumbai is a spillover from the larger war on terror. Al-Qaeda is, for the first time, feeling the pressure in its Pakistani sanctuaries as it is under Pakistani and American attack. But South Asian borders are notoriously porous. Al-Qaeda affiliated organisations such as Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HuJI) have struck deep roots in Bangladesh.

To tackle terror in India it is urgently necessary to stabilise Pakistan and Bangladesh. And, India should seek international help now to upgrade its own security apparatus, but also to stabilise the entire region stretching from Afghanistan to Bangladesh. There is no time to waste.

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Telangana Movement Gains Momentum

By M H Ahssan & Javed Hassan

With support for the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh reaching a feverish pitch across the broad political spectrum, it is no longer a question of if but when the Telangana region would be carved out into a separate entity as the 29th state of the Indian Union. Forces led by the BJP, the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) and others have pulled the rug from under the Congress, which won the elections in 2004 by promising a separate state for the people of Telangana. Now that the opposition parties led by the BJP have jumped on the ‘separate Telangana’ bandwagon, the TDP has made a u-turn after opposing the movement all along, leaving the Congress party in the lurch.

Adding a new twist to the political dimensions of the Telangana movement, NRIs from Hyderabad working in Saudi Arabia) told HNN in an exclusive statement that the changing scenario in the state has placed Muslims on the horns of a dilemma. The worrisome factor, said Syed Zia-ur-Rahman, an NRI executive in Riyadh, is the future status of Hyderabad—whether it will be hived off from Andhra Pradesh as a union territory or made a joint capital of the two states.

Amid these twists and turns, the Nava Telangana Party (NTP), the brainchild of former TDP leader Devender Goud, has sought to hog the limelight through his ‘Telangana Yatra’, which he undertook last month to mobilize support for his party. He has also launched his own website in the Barrack Obama style, with news bulletins in English and Telugu. Video clips show Goud canvassing for his party among the scheduled castes, farmers and the Telangana Employees’ Association which, according to the NTP web news, has joined hands with the party.

Throughout his yatra which wended its way through the Telangana region, Goud harangued his audience, heaped abuses on the TDP and the Congress, while his party workers went about pasting “Telangana State” stickers on buses, buildings and other public places. There were pictures of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar to reinforce NTP’s message as the party of the downtrodden.

Not to be outmaneuvered , even the left parties and those representing the OBCs (Other Backward Classes) have veered round to the ‘separate Telangana’ movement which, they hope, would augur well for the future of that region. The theme of their political rhetoric is the same: they all want an end to the exploitation by the state leadership on the economic, educational and employment fronts.

The shift in the political landscape of the state has upped the ante against the Congress, which finds itself in a bind. If it goes along with Majlis Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (MIM), which wants the Congress to oppose the ‘separate Telangana’ campaign, it risks losing vote during next year’s elections. On the other hand, if it chooses to go with the flow, it could alienate the Muslims. Although the TDP has counseled its ally to back the Telangana movement, the Congress leadership continues to dither for the time being. However, according to all available indications, it is a matter of time before the Congress High Command could cave in, setting the stage for the next big move.

There is a rationale behind all this political drama that is being played out, .both at the Centre and in the state capital. Andhra Pradesh goes to the polls towards the middle of next year, at a time when the Rajasekhara Reddy government is hamstrung by an anti-incumbency factor. Briefing the Congress president Sonia Gandhi on the situation facing his party, the chief minister is said to have stressed that an assembly resolution endorsing the proposal for the creation of Telangana could help neutralise this anti-incumbency sentiment.

With the TDP’s about-turn on the Telangana issue, the Congress is wilting under enormous pressure to scuttle the move. On top of this, Chandrababu Naidu is seeking electoral alliance with K Chandrasekhara Rao of TRS in the Telangana region. The ruling party thus finds itself vulnerable to the ebb and flow of the political tide sweeping across the state.

TDP’s change in its political stance came about when Chandrasekhara Rao left the TDP in 2001 and spearheaded the movement for Telangana under the banner of his own political party, Telangana Rashtra Samiti. Secondly, both the leaders were facing serious threat to their political survival. While the TDP was plagued by defections to the new party of popular film star Chiranjeevi, Chandrasekhara Rao found himself on slippery ground in the wake of a serious threat posed by Goud’s NTP.

Explaining its aims and objectives, Goud said his party will strive for the formation of Telangana state, for which action will be taken both at the political and street levels through agitations. “The party will take up the problems and issues of all sections of society, including the Dalits, tribal and Muslims”, he pointed out. Goud, who had resigned from TDP on June 23 this year, said he was forced to launch his new outfit as the Congress and TDP were stonewalling over support to Telangana and its people.

These developments forced the hands of TDP President N Chandrababu Naidu in reaching out to CPM, CPI and TRS leaders for their support to his party’s decision to back the demand for a separate Telangana state. Naidu’s move is politically significant as the CPM, the CPI and the TRS are in the process of forging an alliance against the Congress and the BJP in the Assembly elections likely to be held in February 2009. “I spoke to the CPI and the CPM leaders as also with the Telangana Rashtra Samiti leader K Chandrasekhar Rao. I briefed them about our five-member core committee’s recommendations on Telangana and that we are favouring separate Telangana,” Naidu said, unveiling his campaign strategy.

Against this background comes the statement of MIM president and other Hyderabad State Muslim leaders who feel that by agreeing to the creation of the new state of Telangana, the Congress would be playing into the hands of the BJP, which has been advocating the Telangana cause ardently.

As things stand, MIM has very little space for political maneuvering given the fact that the TRS, a one-time ally of the Congress, ordered four of its MPs to resign in an act of brinkmanship to keep the heat on the UPA. The move coincided with similar resignations tendered by 16 TRS MLAs and its three MLCs from the Andhra Legislative Assembly and Council respectively. TRS wants the Telangana region to be carved out into a separate state—a pledge to which the Congress had committed itself in the 2004state assembly elections.

It took this line of action when the Congress failed to heed its ultimatum given earlier setting March 6 this year as the deadline for the bifurcation of the state.TRS president K Chandrasekhara Rao said the party will also launch a door- to- door campaign to explain the mass the betrayal by the Congress.

However, MIM, Jamaat-e-Islami and other Muslim organizations have distanced themselves from the Telangana movement due to their apprehension that Muslims may not get a fair deal under the new dispensation. They are also upset over being side-tracked during the ongoing political wheeling and dealing concerning the Telangana issue.

To quote MIM president Asaduddin Owaisi who spelled out his party’s stand on this issue, “It is not that we are opposed to Telangana per se. If a new state is formed, the tally of seats of our party in elections will go up. But we have to first ensure the safety and welfare of Muslims and other things such as the future of Urdu language. Whether these will be safe in Telangana is the issue.’’

As an indication of the shape of things to come, Owaisi cited the recent Vatoli incident when a family of six Muslims was hacked to death in a Telangana village. While MIM’s concern in this regard is understandable, the same factor had influenced their voting behaviour during the Legislative Assembly elections held in Karnataka in May this year. Although the BJP swept the polls and formed a government by engineering defections from the Congress, the status of Muslim representation in the BJP government remained unchanged—a Muslim minister in charge of Awqaf and minority affairs plus some political patronage here and there.

As a sop for the next year’s elections, they have been given some concessions in terms of education and employment opportunities. Furthermore, infrastructural facilities, such as laying new pipelines for water supply or replacing the leaky ones in some Muslim-dominated areas, were put in place with an eye on the upcoming elections. So the bottom line has remained the same. Whether it is the Congress or the BJP at the helm of affairs, some ad hoc cosmetic measures could always be expected as part of their strategy to tap into the Muslim vote bank.

Under these circumstances, continued Muslim opposition to the formation of a separate Telangana state would not be in the interest of Muslims, as it could provide ammunition to the BJP to further isolate the community. As the situation stands, almost all the political parties are now in favour of the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh, with the Congress expected to come on board anytime during the run-up to the elections. Surely, Muslims would not like to be seen as the lone dissenters under these circumstances.

As MP Asaduddin Owaisi put it, the BJP would emerge stronger if a separate Telangana State was created. “The so-called secular parties cannot match the BJP after creation of Telangana State. The future of Dalits, weaker sections and minorities would be bleak in separate Telangana,” he pointed out.

Yet, the fact remains that the conflict has assumed a caste dimension. Other backward classes (OBCs) are seeking to use the Telangana card to consolidate their political base across the state. This game of one-upmanship is part of their ploy to outmanoeuvre the politically powerful Reddys and Kammas who dominate the political apparatus of the state in spite of their small numbers.

Although TRS leader K Chandrasekhar Rao is a higher caste Velama, the banner of Telangana across party lines has been hoisted both by OBCs and Scheduled Caste leaders. Even the Nizamabad Congress MP Madhu Yaski Goud, an OBC, blasted the AP government for its soft-pedaling over the formation of Telangana.

Sarvey Satyanarayana, Congress MP from Siddipet and an SC leader, also spoke in a similar vein, while. other OBC Congress MPs like Anjan Kumar Yadav from Secunderabad are orchestrating their move to jump on to the Telangana bandwagon. Andhra Congress chief Keshava Rao also seems ready to toe the same line.

Another point that should be noted is that .BJP has mobilized Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi in its campaign for the creation of Telangana state. “The party is organising a massive rally of Narendra Modi in Telangana in December. Modi has already proved his mettle by winning the Nano small car project for his state amid fierce competition from Andhra Pradesh and other states after the Tatas decided to pull out of West Bengal last month in the wake of stiff opposition from Mamta Bannerjee’s Trinamool Congress.

Already, BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate L K Advani sounded upbeat recently when he told a massive rally during an electioneering campaign in Hyderabad that the people were now looking forward to the BJP for the creation of the Telangana state. To this end, Modi has been roped in for his pro-development image. Advani also pledged on the same occasion that the saffron party, if voted to power, would expedite the formation of Telangana state within 100 days.

In this context, actor-turned-politician Chiranjeevi took the plunge with the launch of his Praja Rajyam Party (PRP) that, he said, would support the formation of a separate Telangana State that existed from 1948 to 1956, when it was trifurcated by the States’ Reorganisation Commission along linguistic lines. “It is for the Central government to take a decision on creation of Telangana State. If it comes up with such a proposal, our party will not be an obstacle at any cost,” he observed.

“I know the people of this region are overwhelmingly in favour of a separate state. I respect your feelings. If you are convinced that creation of a separate state will ensure rapid development, I am with you,” Chiranjeevi said, emphasizing social justice as the main plank of his political platform.

Chirnjeevi observed: “It will be a party for backward classes, farmers, workers, women and youth. The party will work for development, modernisation and industrial revolution. Its goal will be ’santosh’ and ‘ananda’ (contentment and happiness),” he said, adding: “I know your problems, pains and sufferings and will always stand by you. Let us strive for achieving it.”

However, a cross-section of NRIs contacted by HNN in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, has dismissed these pledges as nothing more than a camouflage for masking their own high-voltage ambitions. Dr. Abid Moiz, a veteran NRI working as a nutritionist in the Saudi Ministry of Health in Riyadh, said: “In my opinion, no party is championing the cause of Telangana. Every party wants to gain political mileage by raising the Telangana issue.” Citing the case of Devender Goud who left the TDP to launch his own political outfit (TRS), he asked: “Why did they remain silent when they were in power? Why are they raising the Telangana issue now? Obviously, it is for personal benefit, the most important of which is becoming the CM.”

He also did not think that the separatist movement would serve the interests of the people, both economically and politically. “No. We live in a global village. We will not benefit from separating ourselves from others. Maybe, a separate Telangana will better serve government employees and, of course, politicians.”

On the question of MIM’s opposition to a separate Telangana since the 1960s, Dr. Moiz told HNN: “ They are of the opinion that the BJP’s influence is widespread in the Telangana region, where the language widely spoken is Urdu. It is my personal opinion that when the states are carved out on linguistic basis, then this area should be made Hyderabad state with Urdu as its language. In the past Telangana was part of Hyderabad, whose official language was Urdu. Hyderabad was then split into three parts on the basis of language and these areas were merged with Kannada-, Marathi- and Telugu- speaking areas of Karnataka, Maharashtra and Andhra, which subsequently became Andhra Pradesh. Then, what about Urdu?”

Urdu columnist-cum-photographer K.N.Wasif, who works for a Riyadh-based Saudi Arabic magazine, too, attributed the political fireworks to personal rivalries and high ambitions. He said Chandrashekhar Rao, founder of Telangana Rashtriya Samithi (TRS), left the TDP to form his own party following some differences with Chandrababu Naidu , the TDP supremo. Meanwhile, there are two new kids on political bloc— Praja Rajyam led by Chiranjeevi, mega star of the Telugu film industry with a big fan following, and Devender Goud who launched NTP after resigning from TDP.

“He also claims that he will fight against the injustice meted out to the people from Telangana. He was a minister in the TDP government and is considered to be the right hand man of Chandrababu Naidu. Anyhow, he is a small -time leader and doesn’t have a large following like Chiranjeevi, who poses a serious challenge for TDP. The Congress has yet to spell out its stand on the separate Telangana movement.”

Making a swipe at the parties, Wasif said the Telangana movement has always been led “by politically unemployed persons who are not sincere in their support for the cause. If at all a separate Telangana state is formed, it will be beneficial for some politicians but it will not be in the greater interest of the people of Telangana, which was always a backward area. After it becomes a separate state, it will become more backward.”

He said MIM had always been against a separate Telangana state since 1969 when the late Dr. Chenna Reddy spearheaded the movement on a mass scale. “Why MIM is against the movement is a big debate which I cannot discuss here.”

According to Syed Zia-ur-Rahman, Executive Director of Al-Ma’awiya Group of Polyclinics, separate Telangana was a burning issue in the last election for almost all
the political parties. However, it was TRS which spearheaded the campaign.to upstage others who were also fighting for this cause.

Asked if the movement will safeguard the interests of the people , both economically and politically, Zia said: “I don’t think so, because during the period of NTR many people from Andhra moved to the Telangana area. They are now holding top positions in the
government and business and controlling the economy of the state. Telangana is a very backward area with a poor educational background. They also don’t have any resources, especially the Telangana Muslims, who are going to face a lot of challenges.”

Zia, who hails from Jangaon in Warangal district, said popular reaction there to the movement has been mixed, with mostly the Hindu electorate being in favour. However, some Muslims have also fallen in line without being aware of its future implications.

On the question of BJP’s support, he attributed it to the Hindu vote bank. “If they establish a separate Telangana, for sure they can form the government, as they do not have a substantial presence in the Andhra region.”

Zia observed that the separatist movement has always been opposed by MIM, “ because it is not in the interests of Muslims. Once they create a Telangana state, they will separate Hyderabad from Telangana like Delhi from UP. Alternatively, they could make Hyderabad the joint capital for Andhra and Telangana.”

The campaign for a separate Telangana state recalls a similar struggle during the 1990’s when the late Chandulal Chadrakar set up a political forum, the Chhattisgarh Rajya Nirman Manch, to spearhead the drive for the formation of Chhattisgarh from 16 districts of Madhya Pradesh. The campaign, which was propped up by major political parties, including the Congress and the BJP, gained momentum as it coincided with other separatist movements for Uttarkhand and Jharkhand during 1998-99.

During that year, the BJP-led Union Government drafted a bill for the constitution of a separate state of Chhattisgarh. The draft bill was sent to the Madhya Pradesh assembly, which unanimously approved it in 1998, with some modifications. Thus, Chhattisgarh came into being as the 26th state of the Indian Union on November 1, 2000 by the force of circumstances that also triggered the birth of Uttarkhand carved out of Himachal Pradesh as the 27th state on November 9 and Jharkhand out of southern Bihar as the 28th state on November 15 during the same year. The BJP, which has installed its own candidates in Uttarkhand and Chhattisgarh as chief ministers, sees in Telangana a similar opportunity to don the mantle of leadership. No wonder, it has mobilized its political heavy weights to improve its fortunes in the polls.

The Telangana movement shares with these three states a common factor—under-development resulting from the exploitation of its economic and natural resources. As P.L.Vishweshwer Rao, Professor and Head, Department of Communication & Journalism, Osmania University, notes in his article: “No movement, no struggle has ever started from the top: from intellectuals, thinkers, political and other leaders, elected representatives and so on. Inevitably, the struggles begin from people – the people give expression to their suffering because it is they who are victims of status quo. The long-dormant hope in the people of Telangana was awakened with the announcement as statehood for Uttarakhand by the then Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda. Within a year it has gathered so much strength that politicians, realizing its potential have jumped on to its bandwagon”.

He elaborates that the Telangana region has the lowest literacy rate and minimal educational infrastructure in the state. As many as eight districts of Telangana out of 10 (including Hyderabad) figure among the most backward educationally. “Mahbubnagar has the lowest literacy rate, both among males (40.8 per cent) and females(18 percent). The entire Telangana, except Hyderabad city and Ranga Reddy Urban areas which are in Hyderabad, has lagged behind educationally. Not a single mandal of Telangana has the national literacy rate of 52.19 percent.”

It is against this background that that a move is under way to prevent the exploitation of Telangana-based college managements by their counterparts from coastal districts. Hundreds of colleges belonging to Telangana managements have reportedly crashed in the competition. For this reason, TRS president K. Chandrasekhar Rao has warned that colleges run by non-Telangana managements would be banned in separate Telangana.

In fact, the birth of Maoism in Telangana, is said to be partly an offshoot of exploitation by people from the Andhra region, some of whom obtained fake degree certificates to corner jobs in Hyderabad. They also used these tricks to remain entrenched in government positions which, in turn, armed them with decision making powers.

On the economic front, they exploited its rich mineral resources as well as the Krishna and Godavari rivers that are the major sources of irrigation for the entire state. Andhra farmers reportedly went even further by cultivating water-intensive crops depleting its water resources. They also preferred cash to food crops to boost their own income while jacking up food prices as a result of these misplaced priorities.

For these reasons, Telangana has been ranked among the most under-developed regions in the country with all its nine districts, excluding Hyderabad, designated “backward” by the Centre. These districts now receive special assistance from the Central government’s Backward Regions Grant Fund. Under these circumstances, the people of Telangana and its parties see statehood as the only viable route to development. Whether their bread will be evenly buttered for everyone remains a matter of speculation at this stage.

One of the strong points of Telangana , however, is its IT industry which gained prominence during the tenure of the former TDP Chief Minister Chandra Babu Naidu. Thanks to its highly skilled manpower base, Hyderabad carved out a niche for itself as India’s second Silicon Valley after Bangalore with its IT and IT- enabled services, pharmaceuticals and entertainment industries. It should leverage its strength in these sectors to create more job opportunities for the people and stimulate economic development to a new pitch.

It is a tribute to Telangana that IT bellwether Infosys of Bangalore has embarked on the construction of its second campus, spread over 447 acres, at Pocharam, near Hyderabad, with a total investment of Rs 1,250 crores. The ground -breaking ceremony of the Infosys SEZ campus was held at Pocharam village in the neighbouring Ranga Reddy district.

Chairman of the Board and Chief Mentor of Infosys Technologies Ltd. N R Narayana Murthy has said that their decision to locate the project in that village was taken in view of the high infrastructure facilities in Hyderabad to make it a premier IT destination.

The Infosys campus at Pocharam is expected to accommodate over 25,000 employees and will be completed over a period of 10 years under a three-phase plan. Work is in progress on the first phase, scheduled to be completed in a three-year period, with a seating capacity of 10,000 employees. The initial investment will amount to Rs 600 crore. Telangana can be justifiably proud of its track record in the IT sector as it looks forward to its future as a separate state.

Telangana Issue – The Real Facts

Leaving aside the politics and the strategies of the politicians let take a look at the real facts about Telangana issue and its status. Do we really need a separate Telangana State?

The Real Facts

Formation of Andhra Pradesh

In 1947 Nizam of Hyderabad State (Telangana) did not want to merge with India

In 1948 Hyderabad State was forced to become part of India

In 1953 Andhra State was formed based on Telugu speaking area (Sacrifice of Potti Sriramulu who fasted until death)

Jawaharlal Nehru appointed States Reorganization Commission (SRC) to divide (reorganize) Indian states based on people speaking the same language. And there was a proposal to merge Hyderabad State and Andhra State. But the SRC was against this as they thought that Hyderabad State was underdeveloped and it better be a seperate state for its own good.

In 1956 Hyderabad State (Telangana) was merged with Andhra State to form Andhra Pradesh

But the Government ignored SRC and there was an agreement called “Gentleman’s agreement” which assured sufficient development for Telangana.

After 13 years starts a movement to seperate Andhra Pradesh again

In 1969 Jai Telangana Movement started People in Telangana region were not happy with the 1956 agreement as the Government did not implement what was promised. Students in Osmania University started this movement and this caused violence and deaths of hundreds of people in Telangana region. The sacrifices of these people were wasted as the cruel politics of Congress lured many separatists to their party and the movement was all dampened.

Today

After 1969 there was not many complains from the people of the region but when even a new party wants to come to power they bring up the topic of Seperate Telangana State to win elections starting

In 1990’s BJP promised a separate state if they come to power but could not as TDP was opposing it

In 2004 Congress promised a separate state if they come to power and merged with parties in Telangana regions to win elections.

Now It looks like the new party PRP by Chiranjeevi is also planning the same to come to power.

Some Controversial Facts:

Pro Telangan:

People from Telangana region pay more taxes (More Alcohol consumption) than Andhra but the claim is that these are being used for the development of Andhra regions. It if were a separate state it can use all the money from the region for its own development.

No Telangana:

Isn’t it a fact that every part of the state needs resources for its own development. As most parts of Andhra have good lands they generate more money and this can be shared if not equally. There are no big movements after 1969 unless the political parties bring it up

Aside from the Facts there are the questions that need to answered

Yes, Telangana was not being developed in 1969. Does that fact still apply after 40 years in 2009?

Isn’t Hyderabad the 5th largest city in the country and is in Telangana region?

Where will the Telangana get money for its development (Still from Alcohol Taxes) or Will it be only from Hyderabad?

Do the people in Telangana regions really feel the pain or Is it just a political game to come to power?

Is it just the small parties in Telangana region that want recognition by getting a new state?

Was the decision made by the government in 1956 based on Telugu speaking people instead of development a right one?

Is it just that people who want identity bring this up so that they could get one?

Will Telugu Thalli be split into half?

Why is this issue so low during NTR’s period?

Does Telangana have Identity crises? Don’t even talk about it. Its about the development of the region.

I wish the politicians or the political parties take right decisions based on the real fact that could develop the Telangana region and give an advantage to the people living there instead of playing games to get power. Be it a separate Telangana State or a unified Andhra Pradesh. If Mani Ratnam is from Telugu he would have made a great movie by now (Just a thought as this is Telugu Cinema Website) Remember it all stated with The Nizam Of Hyderabad in 1947 and after 60 years it still continues…

Note: This article may have little discrepancies from the real facts unintentionally. Corrections are always welcome. This article tried to be neutral as an issue always has two stories.

What do you think? Do you know more about this issue? Do you think some of the facts are missing? Please write your opinion in comments section below.

Are You Ready To Eat Telangana Biryani?

What is common between Hyderabadi Biryani and Telangana? The answer is both simple and complicated. First let’s talk about the simple answer. Biryani is cooked by more than one person; it takes a lot of time to cook; it tastes best when served hot and it turns stale in just one day. Similarly, the formation of Telangana too would require more than one political party; it’s formation too will take a lot of time; it would taste best if formed immediately and it will take merely one political season to rot its demand.

Now talk about the complicated comparison. With less than six months left for the Assembly and General Elections, almost all political parties in Andhra Pradesh are vying to carve out Telangana pie. But just like the Biryani, all political parties seem to be blissfully unaware of the perfect recipe.

Rice, meat, ghee, oil and garam masala are the common ingredients of Biryani. Similarly, Telangana too would require Congress, TDP, BJP, NTP, TRS, Praja Rajyam and other political parties. For Biryani, one needs to get a defined quantity of each ingredient which should be properly mixed and heated for a defined period. Similarly, Telangana would need a proper consensus among all political parties. Any increase or decrease in any ingredient will spoil Biryani’s taste. Similarly, strong opposition or support for Telangana will spoil the taste of Andhra politics.

Just for a little more gyan, let’s talk a bit more about Biryani’s history. No body knows for sure when the Biryani was cooked first, but it was confined to royal kitchens till independence. Later, it became a permanent item in the menu of all marriage celebrations and also entered the market through hundreds of Irani hotels in Hyderabad. Initially, Irani hotels served only mutton biryani but soon they also introduced chicken biryani. It was followed by Kalyani Biryani, Lal Biryani, Shahi Biryani, Mughlai Biryani, Zafrani Biryani, Kaju-ki-Biryani and a lot of other varieties.

Each variety has a different taste. Even the Mutton Biryani served in two different hotels will taste different. Further, Mutton Biryani prepared by the same chef, will have a different taste when he does it second time. Therefore, it is now an established fact that there is no defined recipe for Biryani and each chef will cook it in his own way. But very few people notice these differences and everyone enjoys whatever is served to them in the name of Biryani.

The demand for creation of Telangana too has a long history. In 1969, the Telangana Praja Samithi launched a mass agitation for Telangana. It also won almost all assembly and Lok Sabha seats in the region in the next elections. But the movement was given an unceremonious burial when the TPS was merged into Congress. For almost three decades, no politician dared to revive the demand for Telangana since such demands were viewed with great suspicion.

After 1994 assembly elections, BJP revived the issue and went to the extent of giving the slogan of “one vote, two states” during 1998 elections. Two years later, K.Chandrasekhar Rao floated Telangana Rashtra Samithi. The demand got political recognition during 2004 elections and TRS was able to win 26 assembly and 5 Lok Sabha seats, of course, with a tie-up with the Congress party. Nearly five years later, now almost all political parties are supporting separate Telangana.

Let’s again go back to the comparison. Biryani has no clear definition except for the fact that it is the most favourite food of all Hyderabadis. Likewise, in the present political circumstances, Telangana too has no clear definition, but now it has become the most favourite poll slogan that all parties are trying to adopt. A chef thinks that Biryani with attractive looks and perfect aroma was more important than the recipe. Similarly, for politicians, a bunch of 10 districts and the slogan “Jai Telangana” are important and not the strategy which would ensure its creation.

I think creation of Telangana is not as easy as it is being projected by the political parties. In 2004 elections, both TRS and Congress maintained that if people want Telangana, then they just need to vote for them. People did so. A few days later, TRS chief Chandrasekhar Rao started setting deadlines and after losing full five years, now he believes that Telangana will be a reality after next elections. But being a sub-regional party, it will be impossible for the TRS to get the statehood even if it wins all 109 assembly and 16 Lok Sabha seats of the region.

Officially Congress maintained a strategic silence although some Congress leaders made periodic statements demanding statehood for Telangana in the last five years. There is no clarity as to whether the Congress-led UPA Government will constitute the second States Reorganisation Commission or will it introduce a Telangana resolution in the State Assembly. But political pundits are just speculating that Congress will do either of these to boldly face the next elections. BJP claims that it can form Telangana if voted to power in both the State and the Centre. But BJP knows fully well it cannot form the government in Andhra Pradesh at least after next elections. Recently TDP supremo Chandrababu Naidu joined the Telangana bandwagon and now the Praja Rajyam chief Chiranjeevi also joined in the chorus.

No political party including the Telangana Rashtra Samithi is clear about the roadmap for Telangana. No body is clear as to how a separate state would be carved out of the country’s fifth largest state. They don’t have any answers for both short-term and long-term questions. Will it be a state consisting of 10-districts? What will happen to Khammam district which partly falls in Telangana & partly Andhra? If the state is bifurcated, then what will happen to the four districts of Rayalaseema? Will Anantapur, Kurnool, Cuddapah and Chittoor be merged with coastal Andhra? Or will the state will be trifurcated by giving statehood to Rayalaseema? How water resources will be shared between the newly created states? Which newly created state will get compensation or more compensation from the Centre — Andhra or Telangana?

There are hundreds of hotels in Hyderabad that sell Biryani. Despite a major difference in rate, taste and quality, the hotels do not compete with each other. Several hundred tons of Biryani is sold in Hyderabad every day, because the hoteliers know that the only USP to sell this dish is its name. Just supercede anything with “Biryani” and people will buy it and also enjoy it without major complaints.

Similarly, it appears that politicians have started believing that the only USP to win the next elections would be Telangana. Just say “Jai Telangana” or at least don’t object to others saying “Jai Telangana” and you will emerge a winner. Going by the present political trend, it can be predicted that Telangana will be the major issue during the next elections. Only the poll outcome will tell whether voters find the party with correct Telangana recipe or one that again ends up making a mish mash out of Telangana in the next elections.

Telangana Movement Enters in a Decisive Phase

With support for the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh gaining momentum across the broad political spectrum, it is no longer a question of if but when the Telangana region would be carved out into a separate entity as the 29th state of the Indian Union.

Forces led by the BJP, the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS), Nava Telangana Party (NTP) and others have pulled the rug from under the Congress, which won the elections in 2004 by promising a separate state for the people of Telangana. Now that the opposition parties led by the BJP have jumped on the ‘separate Telangana’ bandwagon, the TDP made a u-turn after opposing the movement all along, leaving the Congress-led UPA in the lurch.

Even the left parties and those representing the OBCs (Other Backward Classes) have veered round to the ‘separate Telangana’ movement which, they hope, would augur well for the future of people in that region, which was exploited by the state leadership on the economic, educational and employment fronts.

The shift in the political landscape of the state has upped the ante against the Congress, which finds itself in a bind. If it goes along with Majlis Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (MIM), which wants the Congress to oppose the ‘separate Telangana’ campaign, it risks losing vote during next year’s elections. On the other hand, if it chooses to go with the flow, it could alienate the Muslims. Although the TDP has counseled its ally to back the Telangana movement, the Congress leadership continues to dither for the time being. However, according to all available indications, it is a matter of time before the Congress High Command would give its green light to the movement.

There is a rationale behind all this political drama that is being played out, .both at the Centre and in the state capital. Andhra Pradesh goes to the polls towards the middle of next year, at a time when the Rajasekhara Reddy government is hamstrung by an anti-incumbency factor. Briefing the Congress president Sonia Gandhi on the situation facing his party, the chief minister is said to have stressed that an assembly resolution endorsing the proposal for the creation of Telangana could help neutralise this anti-incumbency sentiment.

With the TDP’s about-turn on the Telangana issue, the Congress is wilting under enormous pressure to oppose the move. On top of this, Chandrababu Naidu is seeking electoral alliance with K Chandrasekhara Rao of TRS in the Telangana region. The ruling party thus finds itself vulnerable to the ebb and flow of the political tide sweeping across the state.

TDP’s change in its political stance came about when Chandrasekhara Rao left the TDP in 2001 and spearheaded the movement for Telangana under the banner of his own political party, Telangana Rashtra Samiti. Secondly, both the leaders were facing serious threat to their political survival. While the TDP was plagued by defections to the new party of popular film star Chiranjeevi, Chandrasekhara Rao’s position became vulnerable in the wake of a serious threat posed by “Nava Telangana Praja Party” launched by T Devender Goud, the former senior leader of TDP.

Explaining its aims and objectives, Goud said his party will strive for the formation of Telangana state, for which action will be taken both at the political and street levels through agitations. “The party will take up the problems and issues of all sections of society, including the Dalits, tribal and Muslims”, he pointed out. Goud, who had resigned from TDP on June 23 this year, said he was forced to launch his new outfit as the Congress and TDP were stonewalling over support to Telangana and its people.

These developments forced the hands of TDP President N Chandrababu Naidu in reaching out to CPM, CPI and TRS leaders for their support to his party’s decision to back the demand for a separate Telangana state. Naidu’s move is politically significant as the CPM, the CPI and the TRS are in the process of forging an alliance against the Congress and the BJP in the Assembly elections likely to be held in February 2009. “I spoke to the CPI and the CPM leaders as also with the Telangana Rashtra Samiti leader K Chandrasekhar Rao. I briefed them about our five-member core committee’s recommendations on Telangana and that we are favouring separate Telangana,” Naidu said, mapping out his campaign strategy.

Against this background comes the statement of MIM president and other Hyderabad State Muslim leaders who feel that by agreeing to the creation of the new state of Telangana, the Congress would be playing into the hands of the BJP, which has been advocating the Telangana cause ardently.

As things stand, MIM has very little space for political maneuvering given the fact that the TRS, a one-time ally of the Congress, ordered four of its MPs to resign in an act of brinkmanship to keep the heat on the UPA. The move coincided with similar resignations tendered by 16TRS MLAs and its three MLCs from the Andhra Legislative Assembly and Council respectively. TRS wants the Telangana region to be carved out into a separate state—a pledge to which the Congress had committed itself in the 2004 state assembly elections.

It took this line of action when the Congress failed to heed its ultimatum given earlier setting March 6 this year as the deadline for the bifurcation of the state.TRS president K Chandrasekhara Rao said the party will also launch a door- to- door campaign to explain the mass the betrayal by the Congress.

However, MIM, Jamaat-e-Islami and other Muslim organizations have distanced themselves from the Telangana movement due to their apprehension that Muslims may not get a fair deal under the new dispensation. They are also upset over being side-tracked during the ongoing political wheeling and dealing concerning the Telangana issue.

To quote MIM president Asaduddin Owaisi who spelled out his party’s stand on this issue, “It is not that we are opposed to Telangana per se. If a new state is formed, the tally of seats of our party in elections will go up. But we have to first ensure the safety and welfare of Muslims and other things such as the future of Urdu language. Whether these will be safe in Telangana is the issue.’’

As an indicator of the shape of things to come, Owaisi cited the recent Vatoli incident when a family of six Muslims was hacked to death in a Telangana village. “That is why the BJP is so keen on a new state of Telangana,” some Muslim leaders argue.

The same concern had exercised their minds when Muslims voted in strength against the BJP during the Legislative Assembly elections held in Karnataka in May this year. Although the BJP swept the polls and formed a government by engineering defections from the Congress, the status of Muslim representation in the BJP government remained unchanged—a Muslim minister in charge of Awqaf and minority affairs plus some political patronage here and there.

As a sop for the next year’s elections, they have been given some concessions in terms of education and employment opportunities. Furthermore, infrastructural facilities, such as laying new pipelines for water supply or replacing the leaky ones in some Muslim-dominated areas, were put in place with an eye on the upcoming elections. So the bottom line has remained the same. Whether it is the Congress or the BJP at the helm of affairs, some ad hoc cosmetic measures could always be expected as part of their strategy to tap into the Muslim vote bank.

Under these circumstances, continued Muslim opposition to the formation of a separate Telangana state would not be in the interest of Muslims, as it could provide ammunition to the BJP to further isolate the community. As the situation stands, almost all the political parties are now in favour of the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh, with the Congress expected to come on board anytime during the run-up to the elections. Surely, Muslims would not like to be seen as the lone dissenters, even though they have taken a principled stand.

As MP Asaduddin Owaisi put it, the BJP would emerge stronger if a separate Telangana State was created. “The so-called secular parties cannot match the BJP after creation of Telangana State. The future of Dalits, weaker sections and minorities would be bleak in separate Telangana,” he pointed out.

Yet, the fact remains that the conflict has assumed a caste dimension, with other backward classes (OBCs) seeking to use the Telangana card to consolidate their political base across the state. This game of one-upmanship is part of their ploy to out-manoeuvre the politically powerful Reddys and Kammas who dominate the political apparatus of the state in spite of their small numbers.

Although TRS leader K Chandrasekhar Rao is a higher caste Velama, the banner of Telangana across party lines has been hoisted both by OBCs and Scheduled Caste leaders. Even the Nizamabad Congress MP Madhu Yaski Goud, an OBC, berated the AP government for its soft-pedaling over the formation of Telangana.

Sarvey Satyanarayana, Congress MP from Siddipet and an SC leader, also spoke in a similar vein, while. other OBC Congress MPs like Anjan Kumar Yadav from Secunderabad are orchestrating their move to jump on to the Telangana bandwagon. Even Andhra Congress chief Keshava Rao seems ready to toe the same line.

Another point that should be noted is that .BJP has mobilized Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi in its campaign for the creation of Telangana state. “The party is organising a massive rally of Narendra Modi in Telangana in December. The dates are yet to be finalised,” said party leader Venkaiah Naidu in a chat with newsmen recently. Modi has already proved his mettle by winning the Nano small car project for his state amid fierce competition from Andhra Pradesh and other states after the Tatas decided to pull out of West Bengal last month in the wake of stiff opposition from Mamta Bannerjee’s Trinamool Congress.

Already, BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate L K Advani sounded upbeat recently when he told a massive rally during an electioneering campaign in Hyderabad that the people were now looking forward to the BJP for the creation of the Telangana state. To this end, Modi has been roped in for his pro-development image. Advani also pledged on the same occasion that the saffron party, if voted to power, would expedite the process of Telangana formation within 100 days.

In this context, actor-turned-politician Chiranjeevi took the plunge with the launch of his Praja Rajyam Party (PRP) that, he said, would support the formation of separate Telangana State. “It is for the Central government to take a decision on creation of Telangana State. If it comes up with such a proposal, our party will not be an obstacle at any cost,” he observed.

“I know the people of this region are overwhelmingly in favour of a separate state. I respect your feelings. If you are convinced that creation of a separate state will ensure rapid development, I am with you,” Chiranjeevi said, emphasizing social justice as the main plank of his political platform.

Chirnjeevi observed: “It will be a party for backward classes, farmers, workers, women and youth. The party will work for development, modernisation and industrial revolution. Its goal will be ’santosh’ and ‘ananda’ (contentment and happiness),” he said, adding: “I know your problems, pains and sufferings and will always stand by you. Let us strive for achieving it.” Muslim parties should factor in these political equations while formulating their stand.

They also need to come up with a reformist agenda that recognizes the importance of English as the medium of instruction in schools run by them. Even Malayalis, who are so passionate about their mother tongue, are admitting their children to English-medium schools in order to give them a competitive edge in the employment market.

By focusing on Urdu, Muslim parties will no doubt firm up their political base in the community. But they will also be playing into the hands of parties with a vested interest to keep them educationally backward. No wonder, the late Prime Minister P.V.Narasimha Rao had promptly accepted Muslim demand for the formation of an Urdu university in Hyderabad during his term of office.

He saw in it a double-edged weapon that could kill two birds with one shot: win the Muslim vote for the Congress and also keep them on the bottom rungs of the ladder of national development. It was a strategic move that harks us back to the time of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, whose far-sightedness inspired the launch of Mohammedan Anglo-Oriental College in 1875 which was later upgraded into the full-fledged Aligarh Muslim University in 1920. So while there can be no argument over the need to promote Urdu, study of English should also be prioritized in the schools’ curricula.

The campaign for a separate Telangana state recalls a similar struggle during the 1990’s when the late Chandulal Chadrakar set up a political forum, the Chhattisgarh Rajya Nirman Manch, to spearhead the drive for the formation of Chhattisgarh from 16 districts of Madhya Pradesh. The campaign, which was propped up by major political parties, including the Congress and the BJP, gained momentum as it coincided with other separatist movements for Uttarkhand and Jharkhand during 1998-99.

During that year, the BJP-led Union Government drafted a bill for the constitution of a separate state of Chhattisgarh. The draft bill was sent to the Madhya Pradesh assembly, which unanimously approved it in 1998, with some modifications. Thus, Chhattisgarh came into being as the 26th state of the Indian Union on November 1, 2000 by the force of circumstances that also triggered the birth of Uttarkhand carved out of Himachal Pradesh as the 27th state on November 9 and Jharkhand out of southern Bihar as the 28th state on November 15 during the same year. The BJP, which has installed its own candidates in Uttarkhand and Chhattisgarh as chief ministers, sees in Telangana a similar opportunity to don the mantle of leadership. No wonder, it has mobilized its political heavy weights to boost its fortunes in the polls.

The Telangana movement shares with these three states a common factor—under-development resulting from the exploitation of its economic and natural resources. As P.L.Vishweshwer Rao, Professor and Head, Department of Communication & Journalism, Osmania University, notes in his article: “No movement, no struggle has ever started from the top: from intellectuals, thinkers, political and other leaders, elected representatives and so on. Inevitably, the struggles begin from people – the people give expression to their suffering because it is they who are victims of status quo. The long-dormant hope in the people of Telangana was awakened with the announcement as statehood for Uttarakhand by the then Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda. Within a year it has gathered so much strength that politicians, realizing its potential have jumped on to its bandwagon”.

He elaborates that the Telangana region has the lowest literacy rate and minimal educational infrastructure in the state. As many as eight districts of Telangana out of 10 (including Hyderabad) figure among the most backward educationally. “Mahbubnagar has the lowest literacy rate, both among males (40.8 per cent) and females(18 percent). The entire Telangana, except Hyderabad city and Ranga Reddy Urban areas which are in Hyderabad, has lagged behind educationally. Not a single mandal of Telangana has the national literacy rate of 52.19 percent.”

It is against this background that that a move is under way to prevent the exploitation of Telangana-based college managements by their counterparts from coastal districts. Hundreds of colleges belonging to Telangana managements have reportedly crashed in the competition. For this reason, TRS president K. Chandrasekhar Rao has warned that colleges run by non-Telangana managements would be banned in separate Telangana.

In fact, the birth of Maoism in Telangana, is said to be partly an offshoot of exploitation by people from the Andhra region, some of whom obtained fake degree certificates to corner jobs in Hyderabad. They also used these tricks to remain entrenched in government positions which, in turn, armed them with decision making powers.

On the economic front, they exploited its rich mineral resources as well as the Krishna and Godavari rivers that are the major sources of irrigation for the entire state. Andhra farmers reportedly went even further by cultivating water-intensive crops depleting its water resources. They also preferred cash to food crops to boost their own income while jacking up food prices as a result of these misplaced priorities.

For these reasons, Telangana has been ranked among the most under-developed regions in the country with all its nine districts, excluding Hyderabad, designated “backward” by the Centre. These districts now receive special assistance from the Central government’s Backward Regions Grant Fund. Under these circumstances, the people of Telangana and its parties see statehood as the only viable route to development.

One of the strong points of Telangana is its IT industry which gained prominence during the tenure of the former TDP Chief Minister Chandra Babu Naidu. Thanks to its highly skilled manpower base, Hyderabad carved out a niche for itself as India’s second Silicon Valley after Bangalore with its IT and IT- enabled services, pharmaceuticals and entertainment industries. It should leverage its strength in these sectors to create more job opportunities for the people and stimulate economic development to a new pitch.

It is a tribute to Telangana that IT bellwether Infosys of Bangalore has embarked on the construction of its second campus, spread over 447 acres, at Pocharam, near Hyderabad, with a total investment of Rs 1,250 crores. The ground -breaking ceremony of the Infosys SEZ campus was held at Pocharam village in the neighbouring Ranga Reddy district.

Chairman of the Board and Chief Mentor of Infosys Technologies Ltd. N R Narayana Murthy has said that their decision to locate the project there was taken in view of the high infrastructure facilities in Hyderabad to make it a premier IT destination.

The Infosys campus at Pocharam is expected to accommodate over 25,000 employees and will be completed over a period of 10 years under a three-phase plan. Work is in progress on the first phase, scheduled to be completed in a three-year period, with a seating capacity of 10,000 employees. The initial investment will amount to Rs 600 crore. Telangana can be justifiably proud of its track record in the IT sector as it looks forward to its future as a separate state.

Political Sabotage In Telangana!

There are several instances in the history of political movements in India and elsewhere that show how the question of leadership assumes very significance. Although movements are supposed to throw leaders and elevate them during the course of movements, the other way round is also possible in the case of some popular movements in the country. Take the case of Jai Telangana movement of late 1960s. In this instance, political leaders led the movement to its nadir, but failed to sustain it thereafter, and thus worth noting. The movement attracted the national headlines and thereby secured the popular support in the elections held in 1971. Like the JP Movement of mid 70s, the Jai Telangana movement was a popular youth movement. Incidentally, it was Indira Gandhi who faced the challenges of both these movements, and failed to manipulate them electorally. Failed to respond to such political upheavals in a democratic manner, she had to resort to anti-democratic and coercive means, only to betray the spirit of those movements. Of course, the leaders and followers of these movements tried to shirk their responsibilities for their acts of collusion with Indira Gandhi, overtly or covertly. They proved to be the sabotagers of such historic movements.

In the case of Jai Telangana movement, once Congress Union Steel Minister, Marri Chenna Reddy hijacked the Telangana Praja Samiti (TPS) movement of students and employees of Telangana region of Andhra Pradesh and led it to its successful end. Chenna Reddy replaced its first president A.Madanmohan so as to politicalise the movement. Accordingly, this movement-turned party, that secured the popular mandate in terms of winning 11 Loksabha seats (out of 14 seats), swimming across all the currents against the entrenched Congress and the Communists, from the region. Failed to take on the Durga-Indira Gandhi, the Chenna reddy leadership had to yield to the pressures and favours of the Prime Minister. Thus he had to surrender all the TPS’s MPs to Indira Gandhi for few crumbs and thereby sabotaged the movement once for all. However, there was not much noise raised against the act of betrayal, from any quarter including the followers of the TPS. What is discernible from this instance is that the leadership is like a double-edged sword, which can ensure success of a movement, or else it can water down the movements as and when they choose to do so. Thus, the leadership is very crucial in any democratic movement. Although the Telangana movement has always been a democratic one, as the popular mandate was recorded on couple of occasions, the leadership played a dubious role. Unless the leaders are exemplary, one cannot expect them to perform better.

Was the ‘gentlemen agreement’ not an historical blunder? It is pertinent to recollect the violation of this agreement by the first ever chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, Neelam Sanjeeva reddy ridiculing the post of Deputy Chief ministership as sixth finger and thus useless! While he served as Deputy Chief Minister in the B.Gopal reddy’s regime till October 31, 1956, the post became ridiculous to him by November 1, 1956! It was one of the six-point formulas that were violated on the very first day of formation of Andhra Pradesh. Leave alone its sanctity and popular support, the six-point alone was the basis for state formation. There was no referendum of our people, nor was there any recommendation of the SRC (which recommended against merger of Telangana with Andhra state, indeed!) to that effect. Even the Hyderabad State Assembly was divided on the hasty decision. Surprisingly, Prime Minister Nehru’s views on the need of continuation of Telangana reflect the feeling of the then Central government.

Then what precipitated the illegal action of hasty merger was the imposition of Andhra Congress leaders’ viewpoint in the form of ‘Gentlemen agreement’, an historical blunder that was never respected either in letter or in spirit. Who were these gentlemen? Which party they belonged to, by and large? It is those congress leaders who were under the control of Congress coterie that played a dubious role so as to bulldoze the Telangana leaders. Since the Congress party members largely represented the ‘gentlemen agreement’, then that party alone has to own the responsibility. Incidentally, the formation of the state was contractual and conditional (as it was subject to six-point formula/gentlemen agreement), and its very violation on the very first day can be understood as negating the state formation itself! How can the contract be continued if one of its conditions were violated? Does it not tantamount to one-sided contract? It is regrettable to note that such one-sided contract has been imposed on Telangana for that past five decades, thanks to its leaders’ stony silence.

Can minority ever outwit the majority? In the Andhra Pradesh Legislative House of 294 members, only 107 members hail from the Telangana region, which can never have any veto power against the 187 members from non-Telangana areas. Obviously, in the case of any democratic institution, it is the view of the majority that always outwits the minority, not vice versa. Since, there is hardly any protection for a minority viewpoint in the Westminster model (British) of democracy, the minority is bound to bear the brunt of the majority rule. Thus, the rule of majority, that is of non-Telangana areas in Telangana region, for it is merged with Andhra state in 1956, continues unabated. Even if the Chief Minister belongs to the majority party, which obviously has to command majority in non-Telangana areas, he cannot be expected to do develop, leave alone favour, the region the way his people expect him to do so.

For instance, the fate of G.O. No. 610 (that exposes how non-local candidates were appointed against the local quota some 25 years ago) is still hanging in the air. Apparently, almost all political parties favour, in principle, implementing the G.O. No. 610, but did nothing as far as its practicality is concerned. Thus, one can imagine its fate, as its implementation is left to those biased bureaucrats who were actually responsible for the act of illegal recruitment. How come some bureaucrats act so arrogantly that even Girglani had to complain about non-cooperation of government officials in identifying, leave alone punishing, those illegal employees who were appointed long long ago? How come they fail to comply with the norms of government-appointed Girglani commission for more than two years? Where do they get strength from, or tacit cooperation of? How can the government permit such erring officials to continue in office? It is not easy to answer to these questions. For, it is the government that is dominated by the majority in the Assembly of Andhra Pradesh that is responsible for the behaviour of the officials, be it their action of appointing non-locals or inaction of covering up their misdeeds for so long.

Whether the Telangana CMs failed to ‘develop’ the region? Thus, the arguments of ‘development by Telangana chief ministers’ (P.V.Narsimha Rao, M.Chenna Reddy, T.Anjaiah) can be dismissed as mischievous. It may be noted that Jalagam Vengal Rao who cannot be considered as Telangana leader (as he migrated from Krishna district), and thus continued in office without any interruption! Unlike other Andhra Chief Ministers, Telangana leaders always appointed Deputy Chief Ministers from the Andhra-seema region in their cabinets, so as to implement the six-point formula. Leave alone ‘developing Telangana’ our chief ministers never completed their full term so far. However, paradoxically, it is only non-Telangana chief ministers who not only completed their full terms but also created history. Chandra babu surpassing the record of Brahmananda reddy’s long tenure is a case in point. On the other hand, in the case of Telangana leaders, even a great leader like PV could not continue as chief minister of the state for one full year, whereas he completed five year term as prime minister of India, not withstanding his minority-party status at Delhi! In fact, PV was not a separatist like his predecessors, but an integrationist! However, he had to lose his position (CM) for hailing the decision of Supreme Court w.r.t. Mulki rules, as the Jai Andhra movement demanded his resignation. Of course, it is a different matter that even during PV’s regime, the state of Andhra Pradesh failed to get several pending projects cleared, leave alone developing Telangana! Thus, one can imagine the fate of Telangana, in any sector. Viewed in this backdrop, one finds it odd to offer convincing answers to critics who raise questions like why did Telangana leaders(as CMs and PM) fail to develop the region, why do these leaders keep mum when there were discriminatory policies being pursued, why did the Telangana intellectuals raise their voice only when there were non-congress regimes in the state, and whether there was any mandate for Telangana leaders to share power with the Congress party that makes a volte-face on the demand of state.

In any case, it is ridiculous to view Telangana state demand as demand for either ‘welfare’ or ‘development’, be it regionally or economically, as is propagated by the present chief minister. Because, once such argument is promoted, then there are electoral communists ready to join the chorus of raising the question of ‘backward regions’ and demand to treat Telangana on par with those backward regions of the state viz., Rayalaseema, Uttarandhra etc. Then they would be generously seeking the ‘packages’ ‘development funds’ from the central government and thereby confuse the genuine demand of Telangana state once for all. Further, it is also ridiculous to treat Telangana issue as the issue of ‘size’ or ‘administration’ of the region, as is diplomatically raised by the parties and groups like BJP and RSS. As a matter of fact, once the demand is conceded, the Telangana would be bigger state than those existing 16 states in India today! With a population of more than one and half times of that of Nepal, the Telangana state would be of 3.5 crore size. Unlike other three states which were created by the BJP in the year 2000, the state of Telangana does not require any special money for the construction of its state capital city, as the centuries-old Hyderabad is located in the heart of Telangana itself!

Was it also not the failure of the non-congress parties? At the other end, it so happened that the non-congress/opposition parties could not influence the ruling parties and leaders w.r.t. development of the region. At least, they could have strove for undertaking some irrigation and power projects here and there in Telangana. Further, these opposition parties failed to fight for ensuring employment opportunities, leave alone establishing some new industries in their region. In the name of industrialising backward region, the Andhra capitalists were cornering concessions and subsidies on the one hand, but they were importing employees from Andhra areas into Telangana-based industries. While Andhra capitalists were permitted to pollute Telangana lands and fields and thereby to derive industrial profits/benefits, they were not asked to employ the local youth in the Telangana industries. Instead, Nizam-established industries were being closed down and sold out to the Andhra entrepreneurs at a throw away prices.

But still these parties, particularly those from the communist ranks, albeit made some noise now and then, but colluded with the ruling parties/regimes, as if the Telangana development was not their botheration. Why is it that the opposition parties were indifferent to rising unemployment in Telangana? Why is that old irrigation projects were not being completed in Telangana, whereas new projects are planned in Andhra region? Pulichintala project that caters to the needs of third crop in the Coastal area is being implemented on war footing is a case in point. Why it is that farmers in the same state were treated in different ways, (for Andhra peasants were provided CHEAP water with canal-irrigation, whereas Telangana peasants were forced to go for COSTLY bore well-irrigation)? Why is it that there were no agitations being launched when non-local candidates were appointed against local quota, affecting the job-prospects of thousands of Telangana youth? Why is it that there were no agitations against the failure of implementing the G.O. No. 610? These are some questions that deserve answers from the communist parties which believe in equity and equality, linguistic unity, working class unity, peoples’ unity etc.

Was it not the communists’ betrayal of Telangana cause? For those of us who have studied the communist activities in Telangana, their silence alone would be the only answer. Since they cannot reject these questions as illogical, they have to pretend that their silence would speak better. Because, they are simply subjective, biased and opportunistic, they neglect any sort of objective analysis. They practice what they do not preach, or preach what they do not practice. They are hypocritical and played the game of villains, as far as Telangana is concerned. One can trace the roots of the communist hypocrisy in their age-old struggle for linguistic states. Their approach towards religion, region, caste and community are smacked of their farce-class analysis. While they were always engaged in class-analyses on the state, independence, nationalism, secularism, path of development in India, their activities were influenced by their opportunistic shifting stands. Their agitations were based on the sheer electoral objectives. Their elections were being influenced by their compromises on militancy. Their governments were being continued due to their collaborationist policies with their class enemies. As they colluded with their Andhra Congress counterparts in finalising the Telangana-merger, against the popular will of the Telangana people, in the name of VISHAALAANDHRA LO PRAJAA RAJYAM! They helped the Andhra capitalists to colonise Telangana internally so as to continue loot and plunder unabated.

Take the case of CPM leaders, who are playing the role of sabotage in Telangana, long before they emerged on the Indian political scene. Their Bengal BOSSES were competing with their counterparts in other states to attract foreign funds in Calcutta, but opposing the same in Delhi. One can cite several such hypocritical practices of the CPM, which expose their Bengal-bias on the one hand and myopic view of Telangana. That is not all. There is another dimension to their consistent opposition to the cause of Telangana state. More than their Bengal-bias (as some would believe that their opposition stems from their antipathy towards separate state demands of Gorkhaland and Northern Bengal etc), the Andhra-bias undermined the Telangana comrades. Thus, not a single Telangana comrade was ever elevated to the level of State Secretary, leave alone making him a politburo member! Two young Politbureau members, Sitaram yechury and Raghavulu(both hail from Andhra region) alone are controlling the party affairs completely today. Obviously, none can take on these Andhra comrades to question their Andhra-bias towards their Telangana counterparts!

Thanks to the heroic Telangana peasant struggle that cost the lives of ten thousand Telangana villagers, the Andhra communists (P.Sundarayya) became the main opposition leaders in the first Loksabha itself. Whereas, the Telangana leadership that bore brunt of feudal capitalist onslaughts has always been the loser, leave alone leading the Indian communist movement in Andhra at least! For, they did not trust Telangana mass leaders to occupy the highest party positions in the state till date. Thus, once Telangana mass leaders like DVRao, Omkar and BNReddy were ridiculed and dismissed from the party. On several occasions the party fielded Andhra comrades from Telangana constituencies/areas, but not the other way round. In the recent elections to LokSabha too, the CPM fielded a Bejawada Baburao from the Telangana seat (Bhadrachalam), whereas in the elections to the Rajyasabha, the party got one Nellore-Madhu-reddy elected. Even in the party positions too, less said the better, as Andhra comrades were always given leadership in some Telangana districts. But no Telangana leader is ever given any such position in the Andhra areas! This is not just history. Even today, Andhra comrades are leading the party units and frontal organisations in Hyderabad, Rangareddy, and few other Telangana districts are just a few cases in point. These are some bitter facts that are hardly covered in the Andhra-biased media.

Finally, if at all there are any obstacles that impact on the state formation, then it is those Andhra settlers who had grabbed the government positions, violating the legal- local-category norms by producing bogus mulki/local certificates. Obviously, the issue of non-local recruitment (G.O.No. 610 is a case in point) in Telangana region continues to be hanging in the air, as long as the Telangana state is not formed. And of course, there are some political leaders, incidentally, they are not elected representatives of the Telangana people in any sense, (for, they are appointed by the party high commands), who are the main hurdles in the formation of Telangana state. The two invisible entities, bogus bureaucrats and political parasites seem to be responsible for manipulating the Telangana politicians and elected representatives for the past 50 years! This is the crux of the whole problem that delayed the process of state formation. Thus, it is time we realise how this problem is to be solved at once, if at all democratic demand of state formation is to be achieved in the days to come.

Acute Drinking Water Scenario in Telangana

Today, we are witnessing a series of revival meetings for demanding separate Telnagana. Their zeal and enthusiasm are like that of born-again Christians carrying on a crusade against injustice. It is axiomatic that exploitation occurs only between two unequal and that the exploiter would always like to keep the exploited weak. Therefore, development of the Telangana region in a combined state is theoretically not possible. This leaves little scope for the implementation of developmental strategies even if they are suggested. This is precisely what has been happening. For example, the magnificent prosperity of the people living downstream of two mighty rivers Krishna and Godavari, is due to adequate utilization of their waters for their benefit. This is hardly the case with Telangana through which these rivers pass. The people of Telangana, particularly of this generation, feel they are cheated out of their educational and employment opportunities. Add to this the absence of any developmental programs. No wonder, the people are disenchanted and frustrated. Because of the violation of rules made to protect their interests, their faith and credibility in the government has been getting guide seriously eroded. What they are asking for in these meetings, is their right to guide their own destiny. They are not asking for anything that belongs to others. They regard it utterly fatuous when someone tells them not to ask for separation. They see it as an invitation to be exploited further. And they consider it extremely uncouth and uncivilized the way some people try to humiliate them in their own house.

Coming to the question of regional imbalances which are in reality the outcome of discrimination and neglect, it surprising that even in the matter of supplying water to drink, a strange type of indifference can easily be noticed on the part of government . Although Hyderabad is the capital of unified Andhra Pradesh, the water scheme drawing water from the Krishna has been allowed to languish on the drawing boards for almost a quarter of a century. In order to delay the scheme, government has been spending crores of rupees in the name of fresh appraisals; a scheme that was recommended by three expert committees and for which two foundations stones have already been laid, sites fixed and compound walls built. To develop the concept, a private consultant was paid Rs 5 crores whereas, there is hardly anything left to conceive. Meanwhile, the cost of the scheme has gone up from Rs. 129 crores to 180 crores; which means, if the scheme is even taken up and commissioned, only those living on the Banjara Hills and few others, can afford to buy that water, aggravating further the hardship faced by vast majority of city’s population, and incidentally, that of the surrounding municipalities that now form part of the so called megacity. Meanwhile, the water from different river basin is increasingly being diverted to the city depriving the people of Medak and farmers toiling for generations in the are under Nizamsagar their legitimate share. The most tragic of all is the case of Nalgonda. People for generations have been facing the twin problems of scarcity and excess fluoride in the water.

The Royal Netherlands Government had offered to provide financial assistance, which is non-repayable, to provide fluoride-free water to the people who are suffering from crippling effects of flourosis. It is really pathetic to see people afflicted with the disease. Yet no serious effort has been made to secure the grant offered. Under this scheme. around three hundred villages and an equal number of hamlets were to be covered. It was also proposed that Srisailam Left Bank Canal should provide water for some of these villages. The Dutch experts were shocked to hear that though the canal is being dug, nothing has been done to make the water flow in it.

The areas around Hyderabad where the industries are located have become unlivable; the ground water is polluted, denying the people water to drink and the air vitiated in such a way that breathing is hazard. The waste treatment plant has been declared as the biggest polluter by the Supreme Court of India.

The general feeling one can gauge in these meetings is that they have crossed the point of no return. Hope held out for so long has been tormenting their soul; anything offered now is not likely to affect their resolve. They attribute it to sheer arrogance when they hear people saying that they will not concede Telangana.

Telangana is nobody’s pocket. It does not lie in their mouth to criticize those who favor separation when they themselves have deified the man who wrested the Andhra region from the erstwhile Madras province. In spite of all this, it is remarkable that the voice of the protagonists of Telangana is conciliatory. They believe that affection grows with separation. Bonds that have been established between the two Telugu speaking people can never break. And Telangana, as it has been its traditions, will continue to welcome all those who have genuine love for it. Telangana invites them wholeheartedly to participate in search for and the selection of the most appropriate developmental alternatives for this region, not only to remove the present imbalance but also to lay the path towards a glorious future. The real celebration of the fiftieth year of our independence as a nation lies in this.

G.O. 610 & TELANGANA: History is Repeating Itself

The ongoing debate about the much publicised G.O. 610 has made one thing clear, i.e. the history is repeating itself. This order issued by the Government of Andhra Pradesh in December 1985 and required to be implemented by March 1986 is yet to be implemented. It has created a situation similar to the one created 34 years ago by G.O.36 of January 1969. If one recalls as to what had happened then, it should not be difficult to visualise as to what would happen now. The G.O. 610 will not be implemented – it is as simple as that.

The 1969 Fiasco: In an attempt to sort out the issues that had contributed to the Separate Telangana Movement of 1968-69, the State Government of the time issued an order that has come to be known as G.O. 36 of January 1969. It was aimed at repatriating about twenty five thousand non-Mulki (non local) employees illegally appointed in the Telangana region, to their respective places and appointing local candidates in the resultant vacancies. But, the non-Mulkies appointed in the Telangana region challenged not only G.O.36 but also the very validity of what were known as Mulki Rules. After a prolonged litigation, the Supreme Court of India upheld the constitutional validity of Mulki Rules and facilitated implementation of G.O. 36. The political elite of Andhra and the non-Mulki employees appointed in Telangana, however, did not digest it. The result was a violent movement for a separate Andhra state. The leaders of that movement demanded either scrapping of the judgement of Supreme Court of India validating Mulki Rules, and also other safeguards, or bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh into Andhra and Telangana states. It should be recalled that, among others, Chandrababu Naidu and Venkaiah Naidu were in the forefront of that movement. The Government of India of the time yielded to the pressure of political might and money power of the majority region and nullified, by an act of parliament, the judgement of Supreme Court of India, besides scrapping several safeguards given to the people of Telangana as a precondition for the formation of Andhra Pradesh. Consequently, all irregular appointments were regularised, depriving local candidates of their rightful claims over those jobs.

The Present Scenario: After nullifying the Mulki Rules, the so called Six-point formula – a diluted form of safeguards – was foisted on the people. Even this formula has been, and continues to be, violated with impunity, robbing the people of Telangana of whatever little was left in the name of safeguards. It was estimated that between 1973 and 1985 around fifty nine thousand non locals were recruited in the Telangana region. As a result, the people of the region became once again restive and the government was compelled to issue G.O. 610 to rectify the situation. The sum and substance of G.O.610 was to repatriate all non local candidates illegally appointed in the Telangana region to their native zones and appoint local candidates in the resultant vacancies. The entire process was to be completed by the end of March 1986.

But, no one remembered even the existence of this order, until the revival of demand for a separate state of Telangana gathered momentum in 1996. The State Government which was in slumber for so long a time then woke up and started making promises of implementing this G.O. About three years ago, a one-man commission was appointed to work out the modalities. Even before the commission completed its work, this task was entrusted to a house committee of the state legislature. It is nearly two years since this house committee was appointed, but it is yet to complete its work. It has so far given only an interim report.

It should to be noted that the number of employees recruited between 1973 and 1985, violating the statutory requirements, was estimated to be around fifty nine thousand. There could be difference of opinion about the figure. Whatever the number, it was as in December 1985. Since then, neither the G.O. has been implemented nor making illegal appointments stopped. Therefore, the first thing to be done in this regard is to work out the number of these appointments made from 1973 till now, spanning a period of nearly two decades.

According to several unofficial, but reliable, surveys the figure has already crossed two Lakhs. The house committee of the state legislature has not yet done anything tangible to arrive at the number of illegal appointments made in several departments at various levels i.e. district, zone, and region. It has not, so far, looked in to the appointments made in the state level offices and organisations to ascertain whether equitable employment opportunities were provided to the people of this region.

It is yet to look in to the complaints regarding the appointments made on the strength of bogus certificates of nativity. It has, as of now, identified only a few hundred positions, mostly in the capital city and a couple of small departments. The bulk of the work is yet to be done. The interim report of the house committee is, therefore, like the tip of an iceberg. Even this interim report has not been implemented so far. On the contrary, unnecessary legal cobwebs and procedural wrangles are being created. Meanwhile, the tenure of present legislative assembly itself is coming to an end. With this scenario, can any one expect that this order is going to be implemented? It is evident that what had happened to G.O.36 of 1969 is bound to happen to G.O. 610 of 1985 as well – history will repeat itself.

Telangana Liberation – A Peoples Struggle

After a great struggle and sacrifice of Indian people, the British parliament passed an act. It was the act of independence 1947. According to this act, two separate countries, Indian union and Pakistan came in to existence on 15th August 1947. British declared Independence to more than 500 princely states along with India and Pakistan. These princely states were out side the British Indian Dominion. British gave to these princely states their own independent decision to chalk out their future course. They were left free to join either of the states i.e., India and Pakistan or to remain as separate independent states. Sardar Vallabhai Patel, the then Deputy Prime Minister of India took a stern actions to integrate all the princely states. With a stroke of pen all the princely states except Kashmir, Hyderabad state and JunaGadh, decided to join Indian Union.

The people of Junagadh rose in revolt. The Government of India was forced to take over the control of the Junagadh. Jammu and Kashmir remained as independent state for some time but Pakistan encouraged people in North West and also invaded Jammu and Kashmir at that moment. The Maharaja of Kashmir appeared to Indian union and signed the instrument of accession. . The Indian troops went into Jammu and Kashmir and fought the invading forces, and thus Jammu and Kashmir became part of India.

The state of Hyderabad was very big in area. There were 8 Districts of Atraf Balda, Medak, Nizamabad, Mahabubnagar, Nalgonda, Warangal, Karimnagar and Adilabad districts in Telangana; 6 districts, Aurangabad, Nanded, Beed, Osmanabad, Bidar and Parbhani, Maratwada. Gulbarga and Raichur, 2 districts in Karnataka area. Altogether there were 16 districts. Mir Osman Ali Khan, the Nizam of Hyderabad was the ruler. He was having his own currency, postage and stamps. He had his own railways Nizam state railway (N.S.Railway), Bus services, airport and air-services. He had his own armed forces. The state was rich with abundance of minerals, coal, iron, and other valuable metal reserves, further more he was regarded as the wealthiest king in the world. Keeping in view of all the resources, wealth and abundance of natural resources, the aristocrats, i.e. the Nawabs and Jagirdhars, who were around him provoked and forced the Nizam of Hyderabad to declare independence.

On 15th August 1947, the Nizam declared independence and the yellow coloured flag the Asafjahi Jhanda was hoisted. Though the ruler was a Muslim, the majority of people in the state were Hindus. Obviously majority of the people wanted to join the Indian Union. Sensing revolt from the people, the Nawabs and Jagirdars began to make plans to crush down the upsurge of the people if any.

Laique Ali was the chief minister and he was the mastermind behind the entire aftermath happenings in the state. A private army called “Razakars” was formed. Most of the Muslim youth were enrolled as Razakars and they were given military training. “Khasim Razvi” an High court advocate was made the state leader of the Razakars, Razakars is a urdu word meaning “volunteer”. General public in the state were very much disappointed and protested against the imperialism of the Nizam rule. Some people went under ground and fought against the police and Razakars. But the regular police along with the Razakars let loose the terror among the people. There was arson, loot, murder and rapes through out the state. The unrest and upsurge of the people were called disturbances. With the pretext of maintaining peace the regular police and Razakars committed all kinds of atrocities, some of the rich people went out of the state and took shelter in the neighboring states of Indian union. Particularly the people of Telangana area went to Andhra area. The Telangana people, who expected sympathetic treatment from the Andhra people, were greatly disappointed. Instead of showing sympathy and stretching helping hand, they ill-treated them. At every place they were humiliated and insulted. All the essential commodities and foodstuffs were sold to the telangana people at double rates. The house rents were also increased. Thus the telangana people suffered economically and mentally. Here in the towns and cities, the locks of the vacant houses were broken and they were occupied by the Muslims brought from the villages, where there was threat to their lives from the Communists. Almost all the big towns and cities were full of Muslims. The plight of Hindus in these towns was very miserable. There was constant fear and terror and they were living with a danger to their lives. In those days every Muslim even a boy used to say that Hindus were “Gaddar”, “Gaddar” is an Urdu word which means, “traitor”.

Among the people who remained in their houses the police took some prominent persons in to custody that they thought could organize and create trouble. They were put in jails. In Jangaon also some prominent person like Peddi Narayana, Dr.Shankar Rao, K.P.S.Menon, Arvapalli Narayana, U.V.S.Shastri and Harakari Srinivasa Rao were taken in to custody and put in Chenchalguda Central Jail in Hyderabad. Like wise all over the state police arrested a number of influential and prominent people and put them in central jails. Due to the short of place in jails, the Ajanta and Ellora caves were also made Jails. Dasharathi Krishnama Chari, the state poet was also arrested and kept in the Ellora and Ajanta caves as prisoner, where he wrote his familiar poetic line, “Naa Telangana, Koti Ratanala Veena”, such was the patriotism of Telangana people.

During the period of Nizam, there were a number of Deshmukhs, Jagirdars and Jamindars who were familiarly called as “Doras”. With the blessings of Nizam Doras enjoyed full powers to rule the villages at their will and they used to collect the land revenue too. All the villagers, living in small huts were either tenants of their lands or workers working in their fields. These Deshmukhs were very cruel, notorious and unkind to the people. The atrocities of these Deshmukhs were no less than the Razakars. Particularly in Telangana Region there were a great number of Deshmukhs, who let loose the terror and violence among the villagers. Hence the people of this region were forced to join the Communist movement only to check and stop the atrocities of these “Doras”.

In old Jangaon taluk there is a village named Visnoor, where Rapaka Ramachandra Reddy was the Deshmukh. There were 60 villages under his control. He built a big bunglow with the free labor of the villagers. Nothing was paid to the workers. It is called “Vetti”. The workers and other villagers rose against the Deshmukh. They could not tolerate the atrocities of the Deshmukh and his hench men. There was a fierce battle between his men and villagers. Many villagers were seriously injured and “Doddi Komaraiah” was killed. At that time the Andhra Mahasabha led the people movement. They held a big rally in Jangaon town and arranged seminars and meetings for three days where “Doddi Komaraiah gate” was erected in his memory. Many leaders like Ravinarayana Reddy, Baddam Ella Reddy, Arutla Ramchandra Reddy and his wife Arutla Kamala Devi and Arutla Laxminarasimha Reddy spoke. They described Visnoor Deshmukh as “Kaliyuga Ravanasoor”. Slowly the struggle started by the common people of the region against the imperialism, started bending towards communism. Thus communism got its birth in this area mainly because of Visnoor Deshmukh.

During the period of Razakars i.e. after the Nizam of Hyderabad declared independence the entire state of Hyderabad was caught in fear and terror and full of disturbances every where. At that time lakhs of Muslims came to Hyderabad in special trains from Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Orissa. They were all uneducated workers land laborers. Their clothes were shabby and dirty. They were called ” Phanagazeen”. It is a urdu word meaning “refugees”. So the entire responsibility of their rehabilitation fell on the state administration. The Nawabs, Jagirdars and Deshmukhs took some of these refugees to their areas and looked after them. They were given food and shelter. These refugees were also given the army training and they were also supplied guns and made Razakars. These refugees were used to crush the peoples struggle and upsurge.

Babu Dora was the elder son of Visnoor Deshmukh. He was very cruel and notorious. He took hundreds of these refugees to Visnoor and kept them under his control. They not only guarded the Deshmukh building but let loose terror and committed atrocities among the villagers Babu Dora along with the armed gang of these refugees used to go to some villages and harassed the villagers. Every day Babu Dora killed one or more persons wherever he went. In Devaruppula village three persons were burnt alive. He was so notorious that he made some of the women dance naked. Villagers were very much afraid of this Babu Dora. So the Communists of this area fought against these forces. Under this Visnoor Deshmukh there was one village named “Kadavendi”. A youth by name “Nalla Narsimhulu” of this village became the leader of Communists of this area.

All the Deshmukhs and police personnel were afraid of Nalla Narsimhulu. They could not get sound sleep to hear his name. Gabbeta Tirmal Reddy and his brother Madhav Reddy were also organizers of Communists and fought against the feudalists and their atrocities. Arutla Ramchandra Reddy and his wife Arutla Kamala Devi, and Arutla Laxminarsimha Reddy organized the Communist Dalams in Alair and Bhongir area. All these leaders had to go under ground and organized armed dalams and fought against the police and Razakars.

To counter the uprising of the people in Jangaon area, a special Deputy Collector was posted at Jangaon. He was given extra-ordinary powers and the armed special police battalions to crush the peoples upsurge and to maintain peace, law and order in this area. In Jangaon, just behind our house there was a private Muslim doctor, by name Azeejullah. He was well versed in Telugu language. He used to tell Harikathas in Telugu. Azeejullah was made leader of Razakars in Jangaon. The deputy collector used to go to one or two villages every day along with special police and Razakars with the pretext of maintaining peace in the area. Doctor Azeezullah, the leader of the Razakars used to give lectures in Telugu supporting to the government and to eliminate the Communists who were regarded as unsocial elements.

Whenever the villagers heard the sounds of approaching trucks and lorries the men and youth used to run away from their houses without even caring for their children and women. They used to run away in to the fields and forests to save their lives. The villagers who ever remained in villages were gathered at central place and enquired as to who gave food and shelter to the Communists, and then police took such people under their custody. Meanwhile the Razakars attacked the houses and took away all the costly and useful articles, most of the villagers were beaten and killed and the women were humiliated, insulted even some were raped. There was arson, loot, murder and rape wherever the Razakars went. The police use to take some of the youth to taluk headquarters i.e. Jangaon and they were beat and tortured for some days and lastly they were taken out side Jangaon town and shot dead at a small hillock called “Pottigutta”. The dead bodies were left in the open place to rot and were eaten away by beasts and vultures. There was evil smell of the dead bodies around the Jangaon town. The regular police and Razakars under the direction of government officers and the deputy collector committed all these atrocities.

On the other side whenever the Communists entered the villages they also used to enquiry as to who gave information to the police. They used to beat them and took them out side the village and sometimes even killed them. The people in the villages were living in the state of terror and fear feeling threat from both sides i.e. the police and Razakars on one side and Communists on the other side. Their plight was very miserable.

In every state there was a representative of Indian government called resident. Sri K.M.Munshi was the resident on Hyderabad state. He stayed at Thirumalagiri near Bollaram. There was some Indian army with him. Indian government received the reports from Sri K.M.Munshi that there was complete break down of law and order in the state and people are agitating against the Nizam government. But the state government sent contradicting reports stating that there were no disturbances at all in the state. There was perfect peace and no reasons for the Indian government to doubt the Hyderabad state authority in maintaining the law and order .

Villagers in the state particularly in Jangaon taluk was very much vexed with the atrocities of the police and Razakars. There is a village named Bahiranpalli in Jangaon taluk. This village had a “Buruj” built of mud and stones and it was in the centre of the village. By standing on the “Buruz” one can see all around the village. So they employed some youth and kept them on this buruz to guard day and night with guns. They kept watch on borders of the village. They used to fire from the top of “Buruz” and prevented the police and Razakars and even Communists. Thus they protected themselves and saved lives of their children and families.

The deputy collector of Jangaon one day went to this village along with his armed special police and Razakars as a routine of his mission to maintain peace among the villagers, when the guards on the “buruz” of village saw the vehicles of the police and Razakars, they started firing. The police also fired at the “buruz” but could not break it. Further the police and the Razakars could not go even a step forward and counter the incessant firing from the guards of the village. The deputy collector felt humiliated and went back to Jangaon. He sent a wireless message to Nalgonda, the district head quarters. In his message he stated that a few villages at Bahiranpally area are acting as the centers of Communist activity. They have built a strong “Morchas” and also strong-armed men to fight against the government forces. He also requested to send some additional forces with strong machine guns and cannons.

The next day additional special reserved police with military trucks, guns and cannons arrived at Jangaon on 27th August 1948. The deputy collector went to village of Bhairanpally along with his special police battalion and Razakars. At first the police surrounded the entire village so that no one can run out of the village. Then they fired the cannons aimed at the buruj. At once the upper part of the buruz collapsed and the guards on it had to run away from there. Then the police and Razakars entered the village and killed all the youth and men leaving only the children, old men and women. The entire village was full of blood and dead bodies. It was a mass killing. It reminded of the massacre of Jallianwalla Bagh in Punjab on 13th April 1919, where more than 1000 men were killed and several thousands got wounded. It was the most uncivilized atrocity. The Govt. of India got the reports of this massacre committed by the regular police. Sardhar Vallabhai Patel sent a warning to the government of Hyderabad state. He stated that the state government failed to maintain the law and order in the state and its people were put to many unseen and unknown troubles and many people were killed. So the government of India was forced to send its own army to the state of Hyderabad to maintain the law land order to save the lives and properties of the common people. If the state government tried to prevent the army from entering in to the state the army will take action and use force. The state government of Hyderabad protested and countered that the Government of India was having a false report. There are no disturbances in the state. There is complete peace and law and order is fully maintained.

But at zero hours on 13th September 1948, the Indian army started moving in to the state on all sides. On the same day two fighter planes came to Mamnoor police camp and bombed the Aerodrome so that no plane from out side can come and land there. When the army from eastern side came to Khammam, the Razakars went in side the fort and closed the doors and fired on the Indian troops from inside the fort. Two bombers fighters came and bombed the fort from above. Thus the Indian troops advanced from all sides and major general J.N.Chowdhary who advanced from Maharashtra side could reach the Hyderabad on 17th September 1948 and made the Nizam of Hyderabad to declare that he is joining the Indian union. Thus the Indian government took over the control of the administration of the state on 17th September 1948. That is the day Telangana has been liberated.

Major General J.N.Chowdary was made the military administrator of the state. The state of Hyderabad was under the military rule for one year. Even after the military took over the administration of the state, the Communist who went under ground did not stop their movement to fight against the imperialism of the Deshmukhs. Nalgonda and Warangal districts were declared disturbed areas and General Nanjappa was appointed special officer for these two districts. He was given extraordinary powers to crush the Communist movement. Many Communist leaders were taken as prisoners and presented before the court for legal proceedings. Nalla Narasimhulu the Communist leader who terrified the Deshmukhs and Nizam was arrested and presented before the court. After the trial for few years in different courts the Supreme Court acquitted him finally. He continued as the leader of the Communist party and lived in Jangaon till his death. Gabbeta Tirumal Reddy who was also arrested but was killed by the army in a fake encounter. Arutla Ramachandra Reddy and his wife Arutla Kamaladevi and Arutla Laxminarsimha Reddy were arrested and after the trials in the court they were acquitted. Charabuddi Jagga Reddy father of Sri Charabuddi Dayakar Reddy, the present Chairman of the C.D.R.Hospital Hyderabad was also an under ground Communist leader. He was also arrested and after the trial in the court he was acquitted. Ravi Narayana Reddy, Baddam Yella Reddy and Govind Rao Sharab were the leading Communist leaders. They contested the general elections and won the elections. Arutla Ramachandra Reddy and his wife also contested and represented the Communist party in the assembly. Sri Ravi Narayana Reddy contested parliament elections and won the Nalgonda parliament seat with highest number of votes in whole of India. Thus the under ground movement of Communist came to an end. Magdoom Mohiuddin a Communist and a well known journalist won MLA seat from Jangaon. The Communists left the armed struggle and started participating in the mainstream political process and contested the assembly and parliament elections. The underground movement of armed struggle came to an end once forever.

An OPEN LETTER To Sri Manmohan Singh, Honorable Prime Minister of India

Dear Sir,

We take this opportunity to impress upon you the need and urgency of your action in the form of working toward a separate Telangana State. As you quoted Victor Hugo over a decade ago, “No army can withstand the strength of an idea whose time has come” and the Telangana people’s aspiration is one such.

Telangana has been subjected to oppression and neglect for over five hundred fifty years. First five hundred years, Muslim Kings made the decisions for Telangana, and the last 47 years, Andhras are making decisions for Telangana. The Telangana people were free for only four years (1952 – 1956) to make their own decisions. Freedom to determine one’s own destiny, as you know is the highest of the rewards for a true democracy.

Four and a half decades have passed since the State of Andhra Pradesh was formed. As you are aware, the merger of Telangana with the former Andhra State became possible only because a set of solemn promises were made and constitutional guarantees were given to protect against the possible neglect and exploitation of Telangana. These promises were made not just once, but numerous times and all were broken.

Consequently, the exploitation of the region and its people is continued. The people of the region are not only deprived of their legitimate share in the development but are also marginalized in the political process. They have been humiliated on the cultural and linguistic fronts and are virtually reduced to the status of second-class citizens in their own homeland. A prolonged neglect of the region has provided a fertile ground for the emergence and spread of Naxalite violence and also unending farmer suicides.

The development scenario of Telangana is very depressing. There is not even a single sector in which this region has not been ignored. We would, however, like to bring to your notice only a few areas to underscore the gravity of the situation.

EDUCATION

The literacy rate in Telangana is 37% as against 46% in Coastal Andhra, 45% in Rayalaseema and 72% in the Capital City.
Enrollment of students at the school level in Telangana is 30% instead of 40%, based on the size of population. Over 75% of the expenditure on government and government-aided colleges is incurred in the other two regions.
Out of 21 Universities and University level Institutions funded either by the State or the Central Government, 3 are located in Coastal Andhra, 7 in Rayalaseema, 10 in the Capital city and just one in the entire Telangana region.
IRRIGATION

69% percent of catchments area of river Krishna and 79% percent of catchments area of river Godavari are in the Telangana, and Telangana region gets less than 15% of the river waters.
The Coastal Andhra has usurped 80% of assured waters of Krishna allocated to the State by the Bachawat Tribunal. 90% of surplus waters, yet to be allocated, are reserved for the Rayalaseema, denying the Telangana its rightful share.
The Godavari waters have already been harnessed to irrigate more than 12 lakh acres in Coastal Andhra while the corresponding figure for Telangana is 4 lakh acres. The proposed Polavaram Project on Godavari is to serve the Coastal Andhra region is planned to be six times larger than the proposed Ichampalli Project to serve the backward Telangana region.
The net area under tank irrigation in the Telangana region had declined by 76% between 1956 and 1998. The Telangana farmers mostly depend on well irrigation. The farmers of Coastal Andhra get cheap canal water subsidized by the State, while the Telangana farmers are forced to pay higher electric pump bills.
AGRICULTURE

The net cultivated area in the Telangana region has decreased by 22% during the period 1956 and 1998, while it has increased by 4.25% in Coastal Andhra region.
40% of the cultivated area in the State is in the Telangana region, and the institutional credit available to the Telangana farmers is far less. They get 18%, 23% and 28% of the total credit provided by the District Cooperative Central Banks (short-term), the A.P. Cooperative Central Bank (long-term) and the Scheduled Commercial Banks.
Inadequate Institutional credit is forcing the Telangana farmers to fall into the debt trap laid by the private moneylenders, leading to an unprecedented number of suicides during the last five years.
INDUSTRIES

No major industry worth its name has been setup in any of the districts of the Telangana region as compared to the establishment of several industries in Visakapatnam, Vijayawada, Kakinada, Nellore, Tirupati, and Cuddapah.
Quite a few major industries established in the Telangana region during the rule of Nizams are being closed one after the other by the successive governments. Important among the closed industries are Azamjahi Mills (Warangal), Sir Silk Factory (Sirpur), Antargaon Spinning Mills (Adilabad), DBR Mills, and Allwyn Factory. Further the famous Nizam Sugar Factory (Nizamabad) is on the verge of closure.
EMPLOYEMENT

There are about 15 lakh jobs in the government and government-funded offices and establishments. Based on the size of population, 40% of these jobs, i.e. 6 lakhs, should have been filled in by the Telangana job seekers. But the total number of jobs now occupied by them is less than 2 lakhs.
The State Government issued orders as back as in the year 1984 to remove all the non-locals appointed and to appoint only Telangana locals against the vacancies created. Besides not implementing these orders, further recruitment of non-locals in the Telangana region is going on.
FINANCES

The contribution of Telangana region to the State’s Exchequer has all along been around 43%. But the expenditure incurred on the development of this region has never been more than 25%.
The lower per capita income of the Telangana region enabled the State Government to get higher allocation of funds from the successive Finance Commissions. But the benefit of such higher allocation of funds never materialized for the Telangana region.
More than 80% of loans taken from the World Bank and other International and National agencies are being spent for the development of Coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema. But the burden of repayment of these loans and interest on them is being borne by the people of Telangana to the extent of 40 to 43%.
A cumulative effect of these and similar factors, over the years, has been the diversion of thousands of crores of rupees meant for the development of Telangana region, for the development of other regions.
The situation in other sectors is equally, if not more, alarming. The Drinking water is a major issue for the Telangana region. The people mostly depend on bore-wells for their drinking water and are inflicted with fluorosis. The fluorides in the drinking water cause permanent disfigurement, brain damage and there is no cure for it.

Telangana is rich with resources. Telangana people are asking: Use Telangana resources for the development of Telangana region for the betterment of Telangana people. We hope that the national government under your stewardship is aware of these facts.

Formation of Telangana State is as explained earlier is the aspiration of the natives. That aside, the principles governing smaller states to bring government closer to people would build up the economy and empower people in the process. Telangana people opposed the formation of Andhra Pradesh state in 1956, they overwhelmingly voted for a separate Telangana state in 1969. In 2004 elections, the people of Andhra Pradesh accepted the concept of two states, voted overwhelmingly for TRS-Congress alliance, and rejected the TDP appeal for united Andhra Pradesh.

I congratulates you for taking the step toward initiating a dialogue through President’s address to the Parliament and further clarifying it in your first Press conference the future Telangana state. Telangana people have committed to achieve their statehood through non-violence. The conditions are ripe and there is consensus on ground with out any unnecessary hate or dislike toward each other. The time for Telangana has come and please understands that I will continue to work towards the betterment of the region.

Thanking you Sir.
Sincerely yours,

Telangana Supercop

An Open Letter to Sonia Gandhi

Dear Ma’am,

We are writing this letter to you, on behalf of Telanganites across India to inform you and request you to take appropriate decisions regarding democratic demand of Telangana people. We are supporting the just and democratic demand for Separate Telangana. We would like to gently remind you that you too campaigned for Congress party during the 2004 elections by accepting the demand for separate Telangana. The fact that Congress had electoral alliance with TRS, and willing to go ahead with the parties having only one objective to establish Telangana state, is in itself enough that you agreed for the formation of separate state. You have campaigned for Congress party with “Jai Telangana” slogan. That is exactly the reason, they voted for Congress and the current Chief Minister vows his power to the people of Telangana.

People of Telangana peacefully waited for four years for Congress party to honour the main election promise- to move the bill in the parliament for forming Telangana state. The wish of the people of Telangana was included in the common minimum programme of your UPA Government. The President of India, the highest constitutional authority in India, articulated it during his speech to Parliament. Then we, along with people of Telangana, believed that the process of formation of state will be started soon. After four years, people of Telangana are feeling cheated and betrayed.

The popular demand for separate state is now in the hands of a few people who are manipulating Congress party. We feel that the democratic demand for separate state is being deliberately undermined and insulted for the gain of these few individuals in the Congress party. This is not acceptable in a democratic country like India. We are writing to you to examine the facts and agree for the Telangana state immediately to avoid unfortunate events that might be created by the people who are for and against the formation of Telangana.

We have no political interest whatsoever. Some of our families were part of the popular Telangana movement during the process of re-organisation of the country. People of Telangana never agreed to be part of the Andhra Pradesh. The struggle continued for last fifty years- the longest struggle in post independent India. As you may be aware, whenever the people of Telangana had an opportunity, they expressed their preference for a separate state. In 1971 during the peak of Mrs. Indira Gandhi’s popularity, Telangana people have voted for separate state overwhelmingly electing 10 out of 11 Parliament seats. Again in 2004 they voted for the parties supporting separate state, including Congress party, defeating the most powerful politician then in the state and country. In 2006 bi-election, once again they expressed their anger, frustration and bitterness by defeating Congress. How many times do the Telangana people have to express their preference to live in separate state? They lost confidence on state of Andhra Pradesh. They do not need any prolonging in the name of building consensus. There is a consensus among all sections of Telangana people- artists, writers, elites, educated middle class, politicians, political parties, farmers, women – practically every one now wants to live in a separate state.

If there is a referendum more than 85% people of Telangana want separate state. That is what your own senior party leaders wanted to communicate to you in Delhi. They were humiliated because they were denied even the appointment. We on behalf of Telangana people wanted to meet you personally and explain the situation, but we decided to inform you through this open letter with a view that this is the faster way you might be able to listen and take action.

Powerful kingdoms have fallen. Six hundred years of Nizams rule in Hyderabad crumbled when they failed to listen to people. In democracy people are supreme. Listen to the people and their concerns. That is what we would like to request you through this open letter. YSR or Naidu will never agree for separate state. They are part of the problem. Building consensus for Telangana state is certainly required. But you cannot build consensus with those who are part of the problem. There is consensus within Telangana. Telangana will not be a small state, it will be bigger than18 Existing states of India.

Prolonging and delaying in establishing Telangana state will have serious consequences to AP and to Congress party. Your own party men are articulating in public as to how big a damage it might cause to you and you party. A further delay is not in the interest of people of Telagnana, Country or Congress. There is nothing wrong in two states speaking Telugu. The only section opposing formation of separate state is a handful of people who accumulated wealth, power with mafia type of operations intimidating political parties and people. That is exactly what the people of Telangana want to get rid of, and that is the reason we are supporting their just and democratic struggle as responsible people. Forming Telangana state is in the interest of all the Telugu speaking people all over the world.

It is not about development; Telangana people have lost faith in AP. They do not want to live with political, economic and cultural domination. They want to live in peace. They just need their own state. They are prepared to continue this struggle for as long as it takes. We are with them in a small way. We request you to be democratic and listen to people and not to some individuals who are benefiting through unfair means and controlling the political process.

Finally, we would like to state the following. The time is of the essence for any political process. People of Telangana are feeling frustrated and pushed to the wall. The crooked people who are opposing the millions of people’s democratic choice are going to provoke and create violence to prove that they can further intimidate and oppress Telangana people. That will lead to violence and chaos which is what we want you to avoid. As a national leader with moral consciousness, as some one who understands and appreciates the democratic values, you should take a decision now, before it is too late.

We would like to briefly remind you the past. In 1969, in almost similar situation, a CM ordered police firing on the Telangana people. More than 370 young people lost their lives. We are sure you do not want that kind of situation to repeat. No one wants that to repeat, no one wants some mothers to lose their children fighting for their just demand. That is what we are deeply concerned.

The forces opposing Telangana state are determined to create violence and create confusion. They are determined to humiliate the Telangana people with their money, power and mafia type of political operations. They are comparing Telangana with Kashmir, that itself is an indication that how far they can go to oppress the people of Telangana. We firmly believe that you should be completely informed without filtration about the actual situation, its historical past and the implications related to Telangana. We are deeply concerned about the manipulation that is going on to keep you in the dark regarding Telangana issue.

We are seriously concerned about the events that might unfold in future to suppress the democratic and popular demand for Telangana. Please avoid the bloodshed. You can do that. Please do not claim or exclaim later that you were not aware of the situation. That is the reason we are appealing to you through this open letter. You have means to know the actual situation. Just do it through independent and trusted sources. Not knowing the facts is not going to help you or avoid the unfortunate events that might be instigated by the forces opposing Telangana. We want complete peace and we believe that you can help in the formation of Telangana state.

One thing is certain, Telangana state will be formed. Why not now? Keep your promise to Telangana people and share the glory. We appeal to you to start the process for the formation of Telangana. Start now without any further delay. Please note that it is in your hands to save or ruin the Congress party in Telangana.

Sincerely,

Telangana Supercop

CULTURE IN TELEANGANA

By M H Ahsan

Telangana is situated on the central stretch of the Indian Peninsula, most of it on the high Deccan Plateau between the Aryan North and Dravidian South. The earliest mention of this region is to be found in the Aitareyabrahmana. It figured subsequently in the Ramayana and Mahabharatha and in the Puranas. It became ”the region eminently suited for the fusion of the two cultures”.

The language of the people was Dravidian, called Telinga. The race and language had a glorious history that spans over 1000 years. The people had distinct style of their own in the fields of literature, music, dance, painting and sculpture. This culture acted as a bridge between the North and South. There were many Buddhist monasteries built in this region. though it belonged to Dravidian family of languages. They have more affinity in customs, traditions and social institutions of marriage and the like with that of Sanskrit.

By nature the Telugus are considered to be emotional people. They combined in themselves the intellectual agnosticism of the Tamils and the mystic quality of the Bengalis, said Sarojini Naidu. The former state of Hyderabad, for instance, presented a polyglot character consisting of the Telugu speaking Muslims constituting an influential minority. After the merger of the two regions in 1956, many people migrated into Telangana from Andhra districts, resulting in new social tensions.

As Myron Weiner puts it, migrations sometimes have de-stabilizing effects, arousing intense conflicts. There is a healthy mixture of Aryan and non-Aryan traditions and customs here. In this region, customs and practices of Dravidian and Sanskrit features are reflected. In marriages essentially the form is Vedic and many local customs found place. Tying of mangalasutra and pouring talambralu are specially Andhra customs. They are seen in the marriage descriptions of Tikkanas Virataparva and in Ranganadharamayana.

The most important thing is cross cousin marriage, which never had the sanction of the law makers (smritikaras). This is purely a Dravidian and local custom which had to be accepted or tolerated. There was a custom of singing auspicious songs during the time of marriages from the period of the Satavahanas. Married women in this region wear rings on their second toe. They used to apply turmeric to the body and to the face before taking bath. They used to wear saris. Men used to wear dhotis. Both men and women adorned themselves with ornaments. Men and women used to tattoo their bodies. This information is found Peddannas Varudhini.

Women used to sweep the front yards in the morning and decorate the ground with powders of different colors. We find the descriptions about the decoration in Nannayas Mahabharata and Kridabhirama. During the period of festivals like Sankranti these front yard decorations became more interesting.

There were a large variety of these decorations. Mango leaves were tied to the porches for any auspicious occasion. Women used to decorate themselves with flowers. Men also used to grow long hair. They used to consume betel leaf, which was called tamboolasevanam.

People here were fond of intoxicant liquors. They used to make their own liquors. They had varied names depending on the quality. A detailed description is found in Simhasanadwatrimsika that the people of Srinadha’s period lived a luxurious life. There were facilities for the supply of water to houses and fountains.

Their houses were decorated. There were drawings on the walls of their bedrooms. Women use to wear bangles. There were houses serving food that were called pootakulla illu. Rulers used to visit their paramours. Kreedabhirama and Krishnaraya’s Amuktamalyada contain many interesting pieces of information about the social life of the people.

The food of the Andhras needs special mention. Srinadha presents to us the variety of items served. Till Portuguese introduced chilly the people used pepper. They used strong spices to flavor their food. The mango pickle with mustard (aavakaya) is renowned in the entire country.

The entertainment of this region is also varied. There were many kinds of sports and games. These interesting names are known from Gadhasaptasati and Kamasutra of Vastayana. There were literary gatherings, drinking parties and courtesan visits. There were cockfights for entertainment. Young children used to play with ivory dolls. Kings used to go for hunting. Wrestling and boxing were also competitively entertaining. Many of these forms of entertainment are still exist.

Festivals: Festivals are celebrated with much fervor and people used to go to temples on these days to offer special prayers.Festivals are listed below.

Ugadi, Guru Purnima , Sri Rama Navami, Hanumajjayanti , Raakhi Pournami, Vinayaka Chaviti , Dusserah , Nagula Chaviti , Krishnashtami,Deepavali,Mukkoti Ekadasi ,Karthika Purnima , Subrahmanya Shashti ,Makara Sankranti and Ratha Saptami

Telanganites not only celebrate the main festivals, but also celebrate certain regional festivals like Bonalu in Hyderabad, Batakamma all over Telangana districts, Yedupayala Jatara in Medak , Sammakka Saralamma in Warangal district.

Other festivals are Nomulu Vrathalu Kedareswara Vratam , Madana Dwadasi Vratam, Vinayaka Vratam, Saraswati Vratam, Varalakshmi Vratam, Krishanshtami Vratam,Ananta Padmanabha Vratam, Margasira Lakshmi Varapu Nomu Katha,Polala Amavasya Vratam , Kumkuma Gowri Nomu,Sraavana Mangalavara Nomu Katha, and Karthika Deepala Nomu

RELIGION: The major religions of the people are Hinduism and Islam, though Buddhism was the dominant religion up to the 6th century. It is the home of Mahayana Buddhism as revealed by the monuments of Nagarjunakonda. Acharaya Nagarjuna presided over the World University at Sri Parvata. Hinduism was revived in the time of the Chalukyas and the Kakatiyas in the 12th century. The Vijayanagar rule saw the glorious days of Hinduism when the famed emperors, Krishnadeva Raya in particular, built new temples and beautified the old ones. Siva, Vishnu, Hanuman and Ganapati have been the popular Hindu Gods. The Vugra Narasimha swami Temple at Yadagirigutta and Thousand Pillar Temple at Warangal are among the oldest shrines in the state attracting people from different parts of the country for hundreds of years.

In terms of influence, Islam occupies the second place. It started spreading from the 14th century onwards. Mosques began to come up in many parts of the region during the Muslim rule. Christianity began to spread from 1701, Especially among the socially disabled people. Educational institutions and churches grew in number in the Circars in the 18th and 19 centuries when the East India Company and later the British government encouraged them. Other European countries were also active in building churches and taking care of the weaker sections of the people.

Hindus 88.75 % Muslims 8.47 % Christians 3.62 %

LANGUAGE: Telugu is the main language of the state, which was formed on the principle of one language-one state. Telugu, the second largest spoken language in India and it has a long history. While Tamil is the oldest among the Dravidian languages, Telugu has enjoyed a unique status because of “its melody and grace.” It has justly been called the “Italian of the East.” Dr.William Carey, who set up printing press in vernacular languages, published his Telugu grammar in 1812.A.D. Campbell prepared a Telugu-English dictionary. C.P.Brown’s contribution to the growth and development of Telugu is well known. He felt sad that Telugu classics were “in a deplorable state like those of Greek and Latin authors before the invention of printing.” He heralded the renaissance in Telugu literature through his monumental works. Carey, describing Telugu as the most polished among the five South Indian languages, namely Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Telugu and Sinhalese, observed that “its variety of inflection is such as to give it a capacity of expressing ideas, with a high degree of felicity, justness and elegance.” Campbell too lavished high praise on Telugu when he wrote in 1816: “Few languages will be found more copious, more nervous or more regular in constructions, and it may boast, in a peculiar manner, of great elegance of expression and melody of sound.” Caldwell, the “father of Dravidian languages”, gave it first place in point of “euphonic sweetness” and this view was supported by Henry Morris, who called Telugu the most musical of all Dravidian languages.

Quite recently the noted scientist J.B.S. Haldane expressed the view that Telugu could be a rival to Hindi in teaching science, medicine and engineering. Around the same tinie G.H. McLeod wrote that “Telugu is the northern-most memuer of the northern languages: and it has the advantages of both groups with few, if any, of the defects…. It has never suffered from narrow provincialism.”

Telugu is said to have grown out of a synthesis of the language of the native Dravidians and Sanskrit, the language of the colonizers, the Aryans. The influence of Sanskrit began in the 3rd century B.C. and since then the growth of the language is traced. The evolution of Telugu as it is understood now however took place in the 9th Century A.D. Enrichment of the language took place at regular intervals in the history. The names of Nannayya, Tikkana and Pothana are cherished in every home like those of Vemana and Thyagaraja of later periods. Veeresalingam, Gurazada, Viswanatha Satyanarayana and Sri Sri were prominent writers and poets of the last hundred years. The development of Telugu language and literature owes a great deal to the efforts of the Englishmen. Historians noted the “Asia-wide influence of Andhra art” and as a scholar summed up: “The people of this region especially Kakathiyas made a glorious contribution to the development of art and architecture .”

It must be remembered that Telugu varies from region to region in its expression. Here too the Telugu-speaking people proudly claim that the language spoken in their region is superior to that of the other regions. All the same, one unique aspect of Telugu is that it has never harboured, as McLeod pointed out, narrow provincialism. It interacted much with other languages and in Hyderabad city-and neighboring areas, Marathi, Urdu and Kannada have had much influence on the people. It is said that the Telugus’ spirit of tolerance is due largely to the mingling of different languages for several centuries. Urdu is the second most widely spoken language in the state. The majority of the Urdu-speaking people are confined to the twin cities and neighboring districts. Of the total population of Andhra Pradesh 87 percent have Telugu and 7.20 per cent Urdu as their mother tongue.

TELANGANA: A TALE OF UNMITIGATED MISERY

By M H Ahsan

The spectre of drought is a constant feature in Telangana especially. since no attempts have been made to fight it on a long term basis with the implementation of permanent anti-drought measures. The problem is made worse as irrigation is underdeveloped, there has been no industrialization nor has any skill development taken place in the region. The result is that a majority of the people, the poor and the landless are at the mercy of nature. Only a copious monsoon can assure them of at least three months of wages. Or else, they leave their hearths and homes and migrate to distant cities in search of livelihood.

Figures vary on the number of people migrating from the drought prone districts of Telangana: the more severe the problem the greater is the exodus from almost all areas of the state to the nearest urban conglomeration: from the North Telangana to Maharashtra from South to Hyderabad, and from West to Karnataka. According to estimates, during any year, the poorest and the driest district of Mahabubnagar sees the exodus of five lakh labourers, well-known through­out India for their hard work. Better known as “Palamur labour”, they have worked in every major project construction in India and yet they have remained half-fed, half-clothed, forced to live the life of nomads, going back to their native village not only to return to the old people they had left behind but to their soil to which they belong; A soil that remains dry most of the year, which does not provide them sustenance and yet to which they return year after year, season after agricultural season, with hope. According to estimates, as many as 12 lakh people have migrated out of Mahabubnagar in 1997 as monsoon failed.

Though the Indian Meteorological Department predicted an optimistic monsoon this year for the country, as far as Andhra Pradesh is concerned, the conditions are precarious. The onset of monsoon itself was delayed and even after onset, there were no widespread rains and drought conditions prevailed till the end of June. Only during the first week of July, there were rains, although the quantum received was low. Again, drought conditions prevailed during second and third weeks of July, rendering most of the rain fed crops unsown. There were long dry spells ranging from 15 to 18 days in almost all the agro-climatic zones of the State, which stunt crop and drastically reduce its growth.

The South-West monsoon normally sets in the first week of June in the State. But the monsoon in 1997 set in on June 12 and it was well below normal. The most affected region was Telangana with 45 per cent rainfall deficiency while overall deficiency for the State worked out to 38 per cent. The deficit in Coastal Andhra was 34 percent and in Rayalaseema 36 per cent.

The region-wise assessment of rainfall shows that North Telangana received 290 mm rainfall as against a normal of 472 mm as on August 6, 1997, a deficit of 39 percent. South Telangana was the most affected receiving only 201.5 mm rain­fall as against a normal of 350 mm, which was a deficit of 42 per cent. The deficit in North Coastal Andhra was 32 per cent, in South Coastal 37 percent, and in Rayalaseema 36 per cent.

Up to August 27, the State as a whole received 275 mm of rainfall against 441 mm of normal, a deficit of 38 per cent of normal. The districts of North Telangana received a deficit of 44 per cent. This region received 356 mm rainfall as against normal of 641 mm. South Telangana received 247 mm as against the normal of 459 mm with a deficit of 46 per cent. The region-wise split-up reveals that north coastal Andhra received 381 mm as against 488 mm of normal, a deficit of22 per cent. Similarly, South Coastal Andhra also received a rainfall of 190 mm as against the normal of 318 mm the deficit being 40 per cent (Table I). Rayalaseema region which receives a normal rainfall of 233 mm has received only 160 mm recording a deficit of 31 per cent. Revival of the south west mon­soon rains in mid-September did not do much to undo the damage since the crop was a total failure and could not be retrieved. To some extent the late rains filled up the water sources and recharged the groundwater but that was not enough.

The rain deficit in comparison to the normal annual rainfall showed that Telangana’s deficit was the highest with 45 per cent. The rain deficit in coastal Andhra districts was 30 per cent and in Rayalaseema 31 per cent, according to official estimates put out by the office of the Relief Commissioner. The rainfall deficit district-wise showed the deficit in Telangana districts ranged from 31 per cent in Khammam to 58 per cent in Mahabubnagar which was the worst affected (Table 2).

While the Union Agriculture Minister Chaturanan Mishra was taken on a whirlwind tour of the drought-affected areas in Mahabubnagar, Nalgonda and Rangareddy districts in the first week of September, the Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu assured the people that there won’t be any problems in the Krishna and Godavari delta regions but the upland areas would need attention. He did not utter a Word on the trauma being undergone by the people in Telangana. He undertook an aerial tour of Karimmigar in the second week of September and said that the state was in the grip of “severe drought”. It was not until September 13 when he announced that 755 mandals out of 1,110 mandals in the state that Naidu spoke of the drought situation in Telangana.

An analysis of the government’s figures on the number of mandals affected by drought as determined by the new norms laid down by the revised drought manual shows that 84.5 per cent of mandals in Rayalaseema were drought-hit; 76 per cent in Telangana and 59 per cent in coastal Andhra (Srikakulam district not included as the statistics were not available).

The government admitted that about 250 mandals were reeling under severe drought conditions with a majority of them being in Telangana but the govern­ment did not declare the areas drought-hit which would automatically devolve several benefit to the affected people in terms of employment, subsidized food grains and odder, postponement of loan and tax collections.

According to official figures, about 755 mandals out of 1110 in the state faced severe drought conditions. Six out of23 districts have received less than 50 per cent of the normal rainfall. In others, rainfall varies between 40-60 per cent but in view of the late onset of monsoon this year, the damage to crops even in districts which received normal rainfall is expected to be considerable in view of long spells of dry weather after the start of agricultural operations in the wake of monsoon rains.

Initial reports of the situation in the entire state said that against 8.16 lakh hectares of area under paddy during the previous kharif season, only 6.20 lakh hectares could be brought under the crop in 1997 kharif. In most of the areas, transplantations were delayed. Under dry crops, only 28.85 lakh hectares were sown this season, as against 47.34 lakh hectares during the previous season. According to Official statistics, agricultural production in the state is likely to come down by 25 per cent on account of adverse seasonal conditions. Paddy trans­plantation was completed only in 9.30 lakh hectares of land as against 28 lakh hectares. The average was 36 per cent of the normal area for paddy, 65 per cent for pulses, 50 per cent for dry crops and 36 per cent for oilseeds. Groundnut crop was taken up in 6.53 lakh hectares as against the normal area of 11.88 lakh hectares.

According to statistics, the total dry crops coverage in the State stood at 21 lakh hectares as against a normal area of 53 lakh hectares. The corresponding figure of dry crops for 1996 was 37 lakh hectares, which means that an extent 16 lakh hectares was not covered. Most of the dry crops are grown in Telangana Minor irrigation sources such as tanks and wells have dried up due to scanty rainfall and there has been no transplantation of paddy in areas irrigated by minor irrigation sources that which are mostly in Telangana.

While there is quibbling among officials as to when a drought should be declared and what criteria to follow, the most reliable indicators are the pee themselves. Among the people-oriented indicators of drought are: mass migra1 of people, widespread distress sale of cattle, and increased dacoities which attributed to near-famine conditions prevailing leading to unemployment and he the people driven to desperation. Even under normal conditions at least five I agricultural laborers migrate to other areas from the drought-prone Mahabubnagar district which is-the poorest and most backward, during the off-season in search of work. In 1997 it is estimated that 12 lakh persons have migrated.

For a more deeper perspective and the extent of the suffering of the people is necessary to study district-wise the overall picture of the drought.

Mahabubnagar
Mahabubnagar district received only 220 mm rainfall against the normal 432­mm up to August end. Almost all crops withered away with 654 irrigation sour received no water. An estimated 5000 bore wells and about 80,000 irrigation WI dried up. Due to shortage of fodder thousands of cattle were sent off to slaughter houses. In certain areas drinking water was available once in five days and Jadcherla town it was supplied once in 10 days. “Drought pensions” were sanctioned to 10,000 persons by the government in the district while scores of villages turned into ghost habitations with all able bodied persons migrating to distant cities with their young ones leaving behind the old who could not travel.

Mahabubnagar district bore the brunt of drought this year, with agricult1 alone reporting crop loss of Rs 400 crores. The district Collector sent several reports on the alarming situation in the district. Against 9.15 lakh hectares of la taken up for cultivation during kharif season, only 4.45 lakh hectares were taken up this year. Out of the cultivated area of 4.45 hectares, crops in 3.75 hectares were damaged due to scanty rainfall. Normally paddy is cultivated in 1.24 lakh hectares in the district, but this time it was cultivated only 38,304hectares,out of which the crop in 26,m hectares got damaged. As against normal area 2.71 hectares, jowar was sown in 1.37 hectares out of which the .crop in 1.27 lakh hectares got damaged. Similarly, castor was grown in 47,087 hectares as against the normal area of 1.37 lakh hectares and the crop in, 38.247 hectares was damaged due to continuing dry spell. Cotton is normally grown in 79,928 hectare, but this time it was sown in only 49,977 hectares.

Not many efforts were made to change the situation of almost continuous drought in Mahabubnagar district. This district receives one of the scantiest rain­fall and yet whenever drought situation has arisen some temporary measures are adopted but no long-term programmes implemented to reverse the drought condi­tions nor efforts were made to mitigate them through the well-known measures such as watershed development, and harnessing rain water run-off. According to a study, the district uses only five per cent of the rain water for irrigation and drink­ing purposes while the rest flows unutilized into Krishna and Tungabhadra rivers.

Sheer neglect has marked the planning by irrigation department. Several major and medium irrigation projects planned for mitigating the drought conditions have remained on paper. For instance, the Priyadarshini Jurala project, Bhima first and second phases, Nettempadu, Koilsagar, Peddamarur and Kalwakurthy lift irrigation schemes which were expected to irrigate 4.5 lakh hectares apart from providing protected water supply to hundreds of habitations have not been taken up. Successive governments have shown little concern or sympathy with the people of Mahabubnagar.

Medak
Fodder scarcity has become a major problem in Medak as inadequate rains have prevented farmers from growing fodder and barren grasslands have affected cattle and sheep in this district with one of the highest cattle population.

Warangal
According to experts, drought conditions have been spreading to several non ­drought areas in Warangal. Failure of rains for the past six years in parts of Warangal has forced fanners to leave their land fallow which is increasing monsoon after failed monsoon. All the 50 mandals in the district were severely affected. The water level in minor irrigation sources like Parkal and Ramappa lakes and Salivagu project is much below the normal with Lakkavaram Lake and Malluruvagu project recording zero level till July 15. Lakkavaram and Parkal lakes have almost dried up with little in flows into them. It is feared that the groundwater resources would be threatened if such dry conditions continue. In agriculture, paddy transplanta­tion was possble in only 15,000 ha as against the normal area of 1.03 lakh ha. Jowar, greengram, groundnut and cotton crops in thousands of hectares of land were affected by the drought.

The Warangal Collector reported that all the 51 mandals in the district were drought-hit. About 46 per cent of shortfall in rain during the South West monsoon had left 56 per cent of the normal sown area to be left fallow causing a crop loss of Rs 276.95 crores. In real terms, two lakh hectares were left fallow out of the normal 3.53 lakh hectares sown. Out of 1.53 lakh hectares sown in 1997 kharif lack of rains had damaged crops over 38,000 hectares. Special arrangement were made to transport fodder from Palampet to Jangaon, the worst affected revenue division in the district.

Nalgonda
The district faced this kind of drought for the first time in 12 years. The most affected district after Mahabubnagar was Nalgonda. With the exception of only two mandals out of 59 in the district all the mandals have been affected by drought. Only five mandals received normal rainfall. More than half of the villages faced severe shortage of drinking water. All tanks dried up, and with the groundwater level receding, more than half of bore wells too dried up. Crops were raised in only half of the total cultivable area and there was acute scarcity of fodder. Milk collection in the district fell by 15 lakh litres daily due to the monsoon failure and fodder scarcity.

Nalgonda threatened to turn into a desert as land cracked for lack of rain, tanks and small irrigation sources dried up, emaciated cattle were drive to Hyderabad’s slaughter houses and mass exodus of people began. Newspapers reported that in Mallepally village in the drought-hit Deverakonda Assembly constituency of the district, Mallaiah, a marginal farmer of Peddadisarlapally village was taking home an emaciated cow along with its calf which he bought for a throwaway price of Rs 1800. In normal times this pair would have cost Rs 3600. Many farmers, unable to grow fodder, sold away their bulls and buffaloes for a paltry Rs 1500 or Rs 2000. With even dry crops like bajra, jowar and groundnut not sown, there was no possibility of farmers being left with fodder for their cattle. Local farmers said most of the cattle were being sold to contractors of various slaughter houses in the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad. Although this was a regular phenomenon, the sale of cattle for slaughter was more pronounced due to drought this year. The district’s cattle population is 15 lakh but the fodder stock was sufficient for only three lakh heads of cattle.

In 24 out of the 59 mandals in the district, the rainfall was less than 60 per cent in 30 mandals, it was 26 per cent to 30 per cent less in five mandals and 5 per cent less in five mandals. There are 549 small irrigation sources in the district, out of which only 124 tanks received water for irrigation. In the rainfed areas, crops on 7.35 lakh acres are sown in normal years in the district, but only four lakh acres were sown in 1997 due to inadequate rains. With fields drying up in 21 out of 59 mandals there was a drastic fall in paddy cultivation in 1997. Paddy was transplanted in 28,660 hectares of land as against the normal cultivation of 1.39 lakh hectares. Only 19 per cent transplantation could be completed. In the rainfed area, 57 per cent transplantation was completed but with long spells of drought the yield is expected to be low. The Nalgonda district agricultural authorities have estimated that the loss of crop production due to the drought is about 1.23 lakh tonnes valued at Rs 7,333 lakh. .

Dry crops under rain-fed area were planted in only 1.83 lakh hectares as. against the normal cultivation of 2.92 lakh hectares.

Nizamabad
Out of 36 mandals in the district as many as 31 have been declared drought hit. Severe drought combined with irregular and low quality power supply saw the farmers of this district attack electricity sub stations and the staff. They were frustrated that due to lack of power they were unable to use whatever water there was in their borewells to save their crops. There has been only 40 per cent of the normal rainfall in the district resulting in the drying up of 1600-odd minor irrigation tanks in the district. The medium irrigation projects like Ramadugu and Pocharam were nearly dry. The command area crops have been affected as the Nizamsagar dam level reached its lowest level in several years.

Karimnagar
This district was the only “fortunate” one in Telangana which was visited by the Chief Minister to study the drought situation in mid-September when the drought was clear to everyone. For the first time since Sriramsagar Dam was constructed in 1970 it dried up in August leaving no water even for fish which died in hun­dreds and thousands. According to government officials, fish worth Rs one lakh died for lack of water. The dam had dried up in 1987 but that was in summer. For the first time it dried up during monsoon.

The State government took its own time to come out with a realistic plan of action to tackle the serious drought situation and the drying up of the Sriramsagar reservoir which threatened paddy crop over severallakh hectares. Although the drought conditions were obvious in late July itself as rains had totally failed, the government waited until September 13 to declare formally the district as “drought hit.” 25 out of 56 mandals were declared as “drought-hit.”

Revenue minister T Devender Goud has gone on record saying in August ­end that 274 mandals had been identified as having abysmally low rainfall, but he did not dec1!’ire them as “drought-hit”. Relief measures continued to elude these regions reeling under drought. Once a district is declared drought-affected, the government has to waive interest on all agriculture loans and reschedule their recovery, give 25 per cent subsidy on seeds and fertilizers and take up on war-footing relief measures such as digging of bore wells, provision of drinking water and supply of fodder for the cattle.

As many as 37 out of 46 revenue mandals experienced drought in Khammam while major and minor irrigation tanks got minimal inflows. The crop area fell by about 50 per cent in as many as nine of the 46 mandals in the district where the scarcity conditions are acute. The agriculture under the minor irrigation sources, which could not receive sufficient water so far this year, has been affected. About 40,000 hectares of agriculture land lay barren in the absence of sufficient rains. Minor and lift irrigation schemes irrigate an ayacut of about two lakh hectare in the district. There are 382 such schemes, which come under the minor irrigation department. Besides, 300 small tanks irrigate a considerable area. Tanks irrigation an area of 70,000 hectares, canals 65,000 hectares, bore wells 5000 hectares and lift irrigation schemes irrigate 3000 hectares. As many as 43 of the total 46 mandals received low rainfall, of which 29 mandals registered less than 50 per cent of the normal rainfall. Ten mandals got rainfall ranging from 30 per cent to 50 per cent and two mandals as low as 20 per cent to 30 per cent during the current Kharif season. Wazed, Venkatapuram, Charla, Dummugudem, Aswaraopet, Vemsoor, Kallur, Mudigonaa Pinapaka, Manugur, Kunavaram and Konijerla are the worst affected mandals.

Although agricultural operations did not begin and migration had started in full earnest by August end, the government failed to instruct the districts to launch drought relief measures. Official figures of rainfall told the tragic tale: 30 per cent deficit in rainfall all over the state (as on August 31); the situation was worse in

Telangana, with 45 per cent deficit in rainfall until then. The Agriculture Department had submitted a detailed report on the agricultural situation but no action was taken as the Chief Minister was busy with other things. Similarly, the Revenue Department did not react to reports from the various drought-affected districts with the result that no planned, coordinated, substantial drought relief measures were undertaken till the middle of September. By then a large number of cattle were led to slaughterhouses and villages emptied of peop1e as they migrated to urban areas looking for a livelihood. A major problem in Telangana during drought is the scarcity of fodder. Several districts have a huge cattle population which is difficult to sustain in such times. Till August end the government had released only Rs 34.40 lakh to supply the fodder as against the Animal Husbandry department recomm_ndation for the release of Rs 5.37 crore for one month which itself is an underestimated figure. At this rate each drought hit mandal would get barely a lorry load of fodder a day.

As a result of the failure of the monsoon in Telangana, a very small fraction of land sown during normal monsoons could be cultivated. Out of a normal sowr area of 26 lakh acres under dry crop in the region, only 5.3 lakh acres were sown; ‘and as against 3.5 lakh acres under agricultural pump sets, a mere 58,000 acres were brough_ uhder (tultivation. That is, about 80 per cent of the normal sown area under dry crpps and 85 per cent of area under pump sets could not be cultivated in Telangana.

Inflow into the Sriramsagar (SRSP) Project across the Godavari river were the lowest in its history (Table 5). In the absence of water releases into SRSP canals, paddy crop in seven lakh acres in four districts, including five lakh acres in Karimnagar district alone, was endangered. The catchment areas of Godavari were receiving rain but the water was being impounded by the Jaikwadi dam, upstream of SRSP. While the state government made a big row about the construc­tion of Almatti dam in Karnataka and every now and then makes issue over low levels ofwater released from Tungabhadra and other project ,upstream on Krishna river in Kamataka, it has not raised the Jaikwadi issue with the government of Maharashtra It could not persuade Maharashtra to release 20 tmc ft of water from Jaikwadi project on upstream Godavari into SRSP which could have saved the crops. Acconding to estimates, farmers had invested at least Rs 2000 an acre for preparing the fields and for transplanting paddy. The estimated loss of paddy crop, at the rate of 20 quintals an acre, would be nearly Rs 500 crores.

The Major Irrigation Minister explained that Maharashtra had not agreed to the proposal since Maharashtra too was facing acute water shortage due to failure of rains. There was only 35 tmc water in the project as against its full capacity of 120 tmc. He said even if the Maharashtra counterpart released 10 tmc water, it would take more than 20 days to traverse 320 km to reach the Sriramsagar project in Andhra Pradesh. Besides evaporation and transmission losses, more than three tmc water wquld get stagnated at the barrages en route. The government explored no alternative(s; if a similar situation arose in either Coastal Andhra or Rayalaseema, it would have been under great pressure to act, to pay compensation and reduce distress of the people.

The Anjdhra Pradesh Government has replaced the old Drought Manual of 1981, which, was based on the outdated Famine Code of 1950, with a new one prepared by fl, committee headed by Mr. A V S Reddy, a senior IAS officer. The new manual based on the principle of relativity and therefore, is fair, scientific and objective. It has removed all the discretionary powers of the District Collectors in assessing the drought situation and instead made certain physical parameters, such as rainfall, mandatory for declaring ail area as drought-hit.

The new manual says, deficit rainfall in any two of the three other conditions­ sown area to be less than 50 per cent, crop yield less than 40 per cent, and continued dry spell-were compulsory for declaring a mandai drought-hit which would pave the way for state intervention to save the situation by automatically postponing collection of arrears of land revenue, loans, drainage cess, special land tax, rescheduling of agricultural loans and granting of fresh crop loans.

While the old manual merely stated “significant deficiency in normal rainfall as the criterion, the new one scientifically categories the mandals into three, categories; those receiving an annual rainfall of less than 750 mm, those received 750 mm to 1000 mm, and those with more than 1000 mm rainfall. The manual stipulates that the 15 per cent deficiency will suffice to declare the first category mandal as drought-hit, because “a little deficiency in them will have more, pronounced effect”.

For the second category the deficit recommended is 20 per cent, and the third 25 per cent. Without assigning relative significance of the rainfall received in different areas depending on the type of soils, the old manual described “rainy day” as one giving 2.5 mm of rainfall.

The new manual, on the other hand, fixed 2.5 mm for black cotton soils as these types of land have more retentivity-absorbing capacity and 5 mm for red soils which allow run-off instead of absorbing. If any mandal receives lees than the specified quantum during the season, the day will be treated as forming part of dry spell.

For declaring a mandal as drought-hit, compression in cropped area by 50 per cent and above for all principal crops including paddy is being observed as the norm. The area is to be declared “affected” if it reports reduction in crop yields of 50 per cent and above in respect of major crops, and 40 per cent for high input oriented crops, groundnut, Bengal gram, hybrid sunflower.

The A V S Reddy Committee stipulates that the government should use any part of the Calamity Relief Fund for permanent works as this particular fund was constituted to deal with emergency and extraordinary situations. It also permits flow from the fund to the dove-tailed programme.

It also stipulates that one-third of a landholding should be earmarked for growing fodder and for this legislation should be enacted. The committee also recommends use of techniques available with the National Remote Sensing Agency and the Andhra Pradesh satellite research application center. Their “vegetative index” can be guidance to an impending drought.

It is estimated that the season of monsoon activity in the state will have 50 to 75 days. The state is served by both the south-west monsoon active during June to September, and the north-east monsoon active in October-December. The state receives an average rainfall 600 mm during the south-west monsoon, and 200 mm out of the north-east monsoon.

In 1997 while the state was to receive 441 mm of normal rainfall by August end, it could get only 275 mm. Kharif operations have been limited to 50.34 lakh hectares compared to the normal area of 81.67 lakh hectares. The situation in Mahabubnagar and Prakasam districts was alarming with migration of agriculture labour, lack of fodder resulting in the distress sale of cattle and general fall in the purchasing power of the people.

If we were to consider the governmental concern, generosity and the prot­ness that attends on any calamity in a region other than in Telangana, the case of Telangana would be obvious. For instance, in the summer of 1997 widespread shortage 01 power and low voltage in Telangana burnt out hundreds motors of agricultural pump sets and crops withered away. Unable to bear the losses caused by crops least a couple of farmers committed suicide. Farmers became violent, attacked AP State Electricity Board staff, and even raided neighboring villages to get their share of power. All that the government did in the face of this tragedy was to say that the farmers were being instigated by naxalites. And yet when farmers in East Godavari protesting against increased water and power tariffs were caned by the police and one died, there was such a political uproar that not only the Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu apologized for the police action but gave a huge compensation to the farmers who suffered at the hands of the police.

Similarly, in the name of mitigating cyclones and the havoc wreaked by them, hundreds of crores of rupees have been spent in the coastal areas; international funding agencies help was taken, the Central government funds used and volun­tary agencies encouraged to work in the area. While admittedly severe cyclone devastates huge pockets, the damage wreaked by drought, the suffering caused to the people the dislocation suffered by them, and the setback they face is no less than the victims of cyclones. The tragedy of the drought victims is even more horrifying because they are the poorest of the poor; the nature’s vagary makes them poorer. Yet neither the government, nor any NGO, nor the generosity of an international donor has reached them with help other than token help. In fact, an allegation that has gained widespread currency and credibility, given the history of in jus tic I meted out to Telangana, is that the government has held back drought relief programmes for mitigating the people’s suffering because it wanted to con­serve the funds under the centrally-funded Calamity Relief fund to meet emer­gency needs should a cyclone hit the coastal areas during the north-east monsoon from October to December.

It is high time that the government gave serious thought to fight the drought conditions in Telangana. Long-term measures need to be taken to create irrigation potential, improve the region’s ecology, and harness the scanty rainfall. The drought of Telangana is as much a handiwork of nature as of the government’s callous. neglect for over four decades. Nature has been generous to Telangana, endowing it with two major rivers, many lakes and rich groundwater resources. Not so the succession of governments headed by politicians from coastal Andhra, and run by bureaucrats from coastal Andhra. For them, Telangana has become a colony – to be used, exploited, and kept under-developed to serve their needs.

Telangana Politics

By M H Ahsan

Political parties provide the dynamics of political mechanism. Sigmund Neumann has described the general role of political parties as “the life line of modern politics”. It is no doubt that “political parties are not of the government, they are below or behind it”. The voice of the state today is not so much the voice of the people as that of the dominant institutions, economic progress and social morality are all dependant on the political parties in a state so the word “politics” has come to mean “part politics”.

Andhra Pradesh was described as the citadel of the Congress. After its formation as a separate state, the Congress party had an unbroken record of ruling it. In the early years after the formation of A.P. state, the Communist party had posed a challenge to congress. Today it hardly possesses the necessary strength in the legislature to form even a strong opposition. Still its importance in politics cannot be ignored. Political parties like Praja Socialist Party and Swatanthra Party, which made a mark in national politics, created some sensation in Andhra Pradesh. Also the emergence of Janatha Party in 1977 had its impact on all political parties in the state and several prominent leaders in the Congress and other parties joined it.

The political parties which deserve a mention are The Congress(I), The Communist Parties, Swatanthra, The Jana Sangh, Bharathiya Janatha Party, Telugu Desam Party, NCP, Socialist Parties like KMPP, PSP and SP and state level parties like PP,KLP,TPS and Majlis. The ruling of state by the Congress came to an end with the emergence of TDP in the year 1983.

Another significant feature of A.P politics is the absence of a regional issue strong enough to enable a powerful regional party to come into existence. In A.P when a sub-regional issue, namely, safe guards for Telangana came to the forefront, The Telangana Praja Samithi(TPS) came into existence. It is a typical example of a regional party, which can thrive whipping up popular emotions on regional and sub-regional issues. Its activities were confined to Telangana only. The TPS had no ephemeral existence. It secured a sweeping success in the Loksabha elections in 1971. However, shortly afterwards the TPS was merged in the Congress Party. Later in the recent past Telangana Rastra Samithi came into existence with regards to the safeguard of Telangana people with a separate Telangana statehood.

Elections in a democracy have great significance for they act, not merely as indicators of public opinion but also contribute to its evolution as a political system. Elections conducted under adult suffrage are “an act of faith in the common man of India and in his practical commonsense”. Elections have a threefold importance. They influence the policies of government, the organization of parties and opinion of the citizens. Since formation of Andhra Pradesh in 1956, there have been 11 general elections to the state Assembly and 13 general elections to the Lok Sabha.

In 1955, elections were held to the Legislative Assembly of the newly formed state of Andhra. The united Congress Party swept the polls. The Communist Party was routed and Congress emerged as a dominant Party.

In 1957, the second general elections were held for the Legislative Assembly and were restricted to Telangana region. For election to the Legislative Assembly in the Andhra region had been held in 1955. The Congress swept the polls.

Third general elections held in the year 1962 were the first general elections held in the whole of Andhra Pradesh for electing 300 representatives to the state Legislative Assembly. Congress swept the polls by getting 177 seats out of 300 contested.

Fourth general elections held in the year 1967 for the state Legislative Assembly. Result was, Congress swept the polls by getting 165 seats.

Fifth general elections were held in the year 1972 because of the mid term polls for Loksabha. Significance of 1972 elections was 137 conetstants from Congress were from SC, ST and Minorities communities. Result was, Congress swept the polls by winning 219 seats of 287 contested.

Sixth general elections to the Legislative Assembly were held in the year 1977. Congress swept the polls irrespective of the split in Congress party.

Seventh general elections to the state Legislative Assembly were held in the year 1983 and it marked the end of Congress era. The Telugu Desam Party emerged as winner with 198 seats out of 287 contested. Congress just won 60 out of 293 seats contested.

Eight general elections to the state legislative Assembly were held in the year 1985.TDP had an alliance with like-minded parties like BJP, CPI, CPM, and Majlis. The TDP swept the polls.

Ninth general elections to the Legislative Assembly of A.P. were held in the year 1989. Congress threw out the TDP, with Congress winning 182 seats while TDP won 74 seats.

Tenth general election to the Legislative Assembly of A.P. were held in the year 1994.TDP threw out Congress out of power, with TDP winning 2/3 majority along with Communist Parties.

Eleventh general elections to the Legislative Assembly of A.P. were held in the year 1999. TDP retained the power in spite of the internal crisis in TDP Party. But congress slightly improved its tally and reached three-figure mark. This eleventh assembly was dissolved in Dec’ 2003 and Elections are declared in second week of April ‘2004.

THE TELANGANA AGITATION

By M H Ahsan

The Telangana agitation started in the first week of January 1969 in Khammam when students demanded the implementation of the Telangana safeguards enumerated in the Gentlemen’s Agreement. It soon spread to different parts of Telangana. The students got divided into two groups: one demanding the implementation of safeguards and the other demanding a separate Telangana state.

Non-Gazetted Officers threatened direct action on January 11, 1969, if their demands were not met. At the outbreak of the agitation, the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh called for an All-Party Meeting and announced that there was a perfect unanimity among the leaders to ‘achieve full integration of Andhra Pradesh State.

Two issues were discussed and agreed upon:

1) The appointment of a senior civil service officer to decide the question of Telangana surpluses

2) Relieving of all domicile persons from Telangana posts and providing jobs for them in the Andhra region.

Following the All-Party Accord of January 1969, the State Government issued orders for the transfer of non-domicile public employees from Telangana. The Government order on these transfers was the Public Employment Act of 1957. The rules were challenged by Andhra employees in the Andhra Pradesh High Court. The High Court struck down the Public Employment Act and the Rules. The Government appealed to the division bench of the High Court.

A few other Andhra employees led by A.V.S. Narasimha Rao filed a separate writ petition in the Supreme Court on February 4, 1969, challenging the validity of the Government Order and also the Public Employment Act of 1957 and the Rules. The Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court gave its judgement on March 28 quashing the Government Order.

As a follow-up measure of the All-Party accord, the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh arranged for the accounting of Telangana surplus funds. Kumar Lalith, Deputy Comptroller and Auditor General, assessed the surplus funds as Rs.34.10 crores.

The Telangana agitation continued in the meantime. In the beginning it was leaderless. Madan Mohan, a lawyer, formed a forum known as the Telangana Praja Samithi (TPS) in February 1969. Chenna Reddy was sympathetic to these leaders. Violence increased. Firing was often employed to disperse violent crowds. The TPS organized conventions in many towns across Telangana and soon got strengthened. Chenna Reddy came out openly in support of a separate Telangana and K.V. Ranga Reddy gave his blessings to the movement. Law and order continued to deteriorate.

The Prime Minister Indira Gandhi discussed the problem with leaders of the Opposition in Parliament on April 9,1969. Except for the Swatantra Party all others did not support a separate state. The Prime Minister Indira Gandhi rejected the demand for the ouster of Kasu Brahmananda Reddy from the leadership of the Andhra Pradesh Congress.

The Prime Minister announced an Eight-Point Formula on April 11,1969 to ensure the development of Telangana. In consonance with this formula, the Centre appointed two committees:

1. Committee of Jurists under former Justice K.N. Wanchoo to suggest measures to provide constitutional safeguards for the Telangana people in the matter of public employment

2. Committee under Justice Bhargava to assess the revenue surpluses of Telangana.

In spite of these measures the agitation mounted and grew in intensity. Bandhs, hartals and processions were very frequent. Demand for a separate state became the central theme of the agitation.

The Prime Minister visited Hyderabad on June 4, 1969. She met leaders of different groups and political parties. Subsequently, then Union Home Minister, Y. B. Chavan, also visited Hyderabad to have discussions. Consensus reached on two things:

(1) The dismissal of Brahmananda Reddy’s ministry.

(2) Proclamation of Presidential rule in Andhra Pradesh.

Realizing that the agitation was very strongly motivated, particularly about the dismissal of his government, Brahmananda Reddy tendered his resignation on June 27. The Congress leadership sent Congress President Nijalingappa and a senior member Kamaraj Nadar, to seek the verdict of the State Legislature Party. The Congress Legislature Party affirmed its support to Kasu Brahmananda Reddy and suggested that he should continue until normalcy was restored and a peaceful changeover should be opted, giving the leadership to someone from Telangana.

The Telangana leaders felt that agitation politics alone would not be sufficient to dethrone Brahmananda Reddy. This realization made the TPS enter into the electoral politics. It won a by-election in June 1970, defeating the Congress (R). By this time, the Congress had already split at the national level and the TPS supported the leadership of Indira Gandhi. Brahmananda Reddy also supported her.

In the December of 1970, Indira Gandhi dissolved the Lok Sabha and announced a mid-term poll. The TPS eventually contested all the 14 seats to Parliament from Telangana and won 10 out of them. In spite of her overwhelming majority in the Lok Sabha, Indira Gandhi did not give any leverage to the TPS which opted for a compromise in September 1971 and merged with the Congress (R). The deal involved:

1. Continuation of Mulki Rules;

2. Separate budget and accounts for Telangana

3. Separate Pradesh Congress Committee for Telangana

4.Resignation of Brahmananda Reddy in favor of a Chief Minister from Telangana.

The Telangana agitation did not achieve its important goal of a separate state, but secured assurance of safeguards for the region. Its achievement was quite significant. It wrested for the first time the Chief Ministership from the politically dominant Andhras. However, the new Chief Minister, P.V. Narasimha Rao (former Education Minister in the State Cabinet) was an integrationist and politically a light weight in the Reddy dominated Telangana politics. Ten portfolios in his ministry went to Telangana, three of them belonging to the erstwhile TPS.

FREEEDOM STRUGGLE IN TELANGANA

By M H Ahsan

The role of the Telangana in the Freedom Struggle was significant and they had always been in the forefront along with the rest of the country. The first rebellion for Independence in 1857 did not affect the state of affairs in the south, though ripples were felt in the State of Hyderabad.But British suppressed the rebellions led by Rohilla and Arab soldiers and the Gonds in the Adilabad district under the leadership of Ramji Gond in 1860.

There were occasional rebellions of the peasants here and there, brought out by their dissatisfaction to the forefront. Agriculture became the mainstay of the people, as the cottage industries dwindled due to the deliberate policy of the Government to encourage British industries at the expense of the indigenous ones. The construction of dams across the Godavari and the Krishna in 1852 and 1855 respectively resulted in increasing agricultural production. The emergence of the strong, educated, and confident but dissatisfied middle class seeking equality with the white ruler was seen in the beginning of the twentieth century.

In 1920, when Mahatma Gandhi started non-co-operation movement, it had an immediate response in Telangana. Many lawyers gave up their lucrative practice and many students gave up their studies. In November 1921, the Congress gave permission to the Provincial Committee to start Civil Disobedience, if the conditions laid down by Mahatma Gandhi were fulfilled.

The next episode was the Forest Satyagraha of the ryots. The peasants had to pay heavy tax for permission to graze their cattle in forests. When the crops failed, they decided to send their cattle into the forests. They took the cattle forcibly, confined them in cattle-pounds and refused to free them unless the fee was paid. There was a clash between the cattle owners and the armed police. Gandhiji called off the Non Co-operation Movement due to some untoward incidents.

In 1930, Mahatma Gandhi started his salt-campaign. Telangana region became the venue of memorable deeds of many a young man and woman. The thirties saw the emergence of leftist organizations, which gave a fillip to the progressive trends. The arrest of the leaders in 1942 provoked the masses. The message of the National Congress inspired the people, and they brought the functioning of the Government to a stand still for a few days. Many young students and workers faced the bullets cheerfully.

History of Telangana

By M H Ahsan

Telangana region has been ruled by many great dynasties like Sathavahanas, Chalukyas, Kakatiyas, Mughals, Qutubshahis, asafjahis. Of which the Kakathiyas impressions on architecture are found more in these days too. Sathavahanas ruled over the Telangana for about 400 years from the 2nd century B.C. to beyond the 2nd century A.D. Sathavahanas were also called Salivahanas and Satakarnis. In the 3rd century B.C., Simukha, the founder of the Sathavahana dynasty, unified the various Andhra principalities into one kingdom and became its ruler (271 B.C. — 248 B.C.).Satakarni II, the sixth ruler of the dynasty (184 B.C.) was an able ruler who extended his kingdom to the west. He ruled for a period of 56 years. Pulumavi I has brought renewed strength and glory to their kingdom. The only silver lining in this dynasty was the excellent literary work, Gathasaptasati, of Hala, the 17th Satavahana king. Dharmapuri in Karimnagar was the capital city for many years.

Among Kakathiyas , Prataparudra, grandson of Rudramamba was great ruler who succeeded his grandmother in A.D.1295 and ruled till A.D.1323. He pushed the western border of his kingdom up to Raichur. He introduced many administrative reforms. He divided the kingdom into 75 Nayakships, which was later adopted and developed by the Vijayanagara Rayas.

During the reign of Bahamani sultan Mohd Shah III, one sultan Quli Qutub, who was born at Hamadan in Persia, came to Deccan and started his career as a bodyguard of Mohd Shah. With his ability and courage he rose from one position to another till he became the Governor of Telangana, the eastren province of Bahmani kingdom.

When the Bahamani sultanate became weak, Quli Qutub became independent and formed his Qutubshahi Dynasty in 1518. From then, he devoted most of his energies in extending his frontiers of his kingdom. He took possession of part of Berar in the north, Rajkonda, Deverkonda, Gahanpura, Kovilakonda and Panagal thus brought much of Telugu speaking areas in to his possession. He defeated Sitapati of Bhogikala, and captured Bellamkonda, Indrakonda, Khammam, Warangal etc. in 1543 Jamsheed assassinated Quli Qutub.

The Golkonda fort was built by Quliqutub. His son Jamsheed became the King who was succeeded by his brother Ibrahim in 1550 .During his reign, trade and commerce flourished enormously. Telangana, like Egypt, became the Mart of the whole world. Merchants from Turkistan, Arabia and Persia used to frequent Telangana and found their trade attractive and prosperous. In his reign two tanks namely Ibrahim Pantam tank and Hussainsagar were built. He also built a bridge on river Musi, which is known as Puranapul. The Hindus of Telangana remember him for his patronage of Telugu literature. Many Telugu poets like Addanki Gangadher Kavi, Panuganti Telanganarya, Kandukuri Rudra Kavi flourished in his court. He gained goodwill among his Hindu subjects. He died in 1580, and was succeeded by his son Quli Qutub Shah.

Qutubshah shifted his capital from Golkonda to Hyderabad on the river Musi. He built the Jamia mosque at Charminar. He died in 1611. He was succeeded by his nephew Mohd. Qutubshah as he had no sons. Mohd Qutub Shah joined the confederation of Deccani powers against Moughals to stop their advance towards Deccan/South. He was a scholar and composed gazals, tarki, bunds and rubaya. He died in 1662, and was succeeded by his son-in-law Sayyed Ahmed in 1667.

At this time the Moughals annexed Ahmednagar and marched towards Golkonda. Sayyed Ahmed signed the treaty, and accepted the suzerainity of Moughal emporer Shah Jahan and agreed to pay 8 lakhs of rupees as tribute to Moughlals.

With the connivance of mirjumla the Mughal Emperor Aurgangzeb sent his son Mohd. Sultan in 1656, who besiezed Golkonda and occupied Hyderabad. However on intervention of Darashekou and Jahanara from Delhi, Aurangazeb was compelled to raise the seize on payment of one crore and to surrender Chinnoor. Later Mohd Sultan married the second daughter of Abdullah. Abdullah died in 1672 and his son-in-law Abul Hassan succeeded him. He appointed Madanna as his Prime Minister and his brother Akkanna as commander in chief. In 1687 Auragazeb again attacked Golkonda which successfully resisted -his advance. But due to treachery of Sardar Khan a high officer in the Army who opened the gate of Golkonda fort, captured the fort in 1687 and Abul Hassan was made captive. They looted the city in every street and market place where lakhs worth in cash, property, chinaware and costly carpets of aristocracy was available.

The State of Hyderabad was founded by Mir Qamruddin Chin Qilich Khan. He was the son of Aurangzeb’s general . Ghazi-ud-din Khan Feroz Jang, who traced his ancestry to Abu Bakr, the first Khalifa. In 1713, six years after Aurangzeb’s death, emperor Farrukhsiyar made Mir Qamruddin Viceroy of the Deccan, with the title of Nizam-ul-Mulk Feroz Jang. Later, emperor Muhammad Shah conferred on him the title of Asaf Jah, by which title the dynasty is still known. By 1724, Mir Qamruddin had made himself virtually independent of Delhi, although he and his successors continued to profess a nominal allegiance to the Moghul emperor right up to 1858, when the British Crown assumed the governance of India.

In 1799 the Nizam aided the East India Company in the war with Tippu Sultan and after the latter’s defeat and death, the British gave a part of his territories to the Nizam.

The death of Nizam All Khan and the succession of his eldest surviving son, Sikander Jah, occured on 7 August 1803.

Sikander Jah died on 21 May 1829, and was succeeded by his eldest surviving son, nasir-ud-Daula. By the Treaty of 1853, the province of Berar, along with certain districits in the Raichur Doab and on the wertern frontier of Hyderabad, were assigned for this purpose, their administration being taken over by British officers under the control of the Resident at Hyderabad.

By the Treaty of 1860, except for Berar, all the other districts assigned in 1853 were restored.

Mir Mahbub Ali Khan was a minor when he succeeded his father afzal-ud-Daula on 26 February 1869.

The Hyderabad contingent with the exception of the artillery which was disbanded, was delocalized and incorporated in the Indian Army, with provision for the protection of the Nizam’s dominion.

Nizam Mir Usman Ali Khan Bahadur is the seventh in the line. He succeeded to the gaddi on 29 August 1911. In 1918 the title of “is Exalted Highness” was conferred on him as a hereditary distinction. Shortly thereafter, by an autograph letter from the King, he was granted the title of ‘Faithful Ally of the British Government.’

Geographically, Hyderabad occupies a pivotal position in the heart of the country. In population, revenue and importance it was the premier State in the country. The population was nearly sixteen million and the annual revenue Rs. 26 crores. Its area was over 82,000 square miles. Hyderabad had its own coinage, paper currency and stamps. Hyderabad was treated by the British no differently from other Indian States. The right of intervention in internal affairs was repeatedly asserted and exercised.

In 1985 Reading, then Viceroy, ascertained that the sovereignty of the British Crown was supreme in India. The Viceroy pointed out that it was the right of the British Government to intervene in the internal affairs of Indian States, and that the Nizam did not stand in a category separate from that of rulers of the other Indian states.

In March 1946 the cabinet mission advised the princely states regarding the future of their merger after the formation of independent India, and separate Pakistan for Indian Muslims. This was further clarified in May 1946 referring to the lapse of paramountency and formation of federation. The congress opposed the Independent states outside the Federal Union, but the Muslim league was encouraging the states to remain Independent. Nizam of Hyderabad was under the influence of a fanatical body called Ittehadul Musulmin under Kasim Razvi, declared his intention to remain as independent state.

Soon after the announcement of His Majesty’s Government’s plan of 3 June 1947, the Nizam issued a firman declaring his intention not to send representatives to the Constituent Assembly of either Pakistan or India, and making it clear that on 15 August he would be entitled to resume the status of an independent sovereign. It had been his ambition to secure Dominion Status for his State, on the withdrawal of the British and treatment then henceforth as a member of the British Commonwealth of Nations. When he saw that clause 7 of the Indian Independence Bill did not permit that grant of Dominion Status to an Indian State. The Nizam sent a delegation to Delhi on 11 July headed by the Nawab of Chhatari, President of the Executive Council, to meet Lord Mountbatten.

Meanwhile, Laik Ali was pressing that the Hyderabad issue should be taken to the United Nations Organization. On 17 August, he wrote to Nehru that Hyderabad had decided to solicit the good offices of the United Nations Organization in order that the dispute between Hyderabad and India might be resolved and a peaceful and enduring settlement arrived at.

The Indian Government did not agree that Hyderabad had any right in international law to seek the intervention of the United Nations Organization or any other outside body for the settlement of the issue. And that as the Government of India regarded the Indo-Hyderabad dispute as a purely domestic one, they did not recognize the Nizam’s claim to invoke the good offices of the United Nations in that connation.

The below given are the detailed notes on the history of Ancient,medieval ,modern period of the Telangana region and also the freedom struggle, Razakar Movement and The separate Telangana agitation.

Hyderabad reality on high rise

By M H AHSAN

Hyderabad is India’s 6th largest metropolis and the 40th largest metropolitan area in the world, with more than 6.1 million people making it a happening place. The IT sector of Hyderabad had spelled bound investors and realtors and not for nothing, the 1500 acre IT Park at Secunderabad has made almost 50% IT buyers in the real estate boom.

Hyderabad has never had it so good. Its real estate prices in fact have never been this high in the last decade. If there is one indication that a city is growing and boasts of a booming economy with promise of more to come, it is in the demand for real estate and the price it commands.

Along with the boom in the number of IT and ITES companies in Hyderabad, the city is also witnessing a corresponding boom in its realty prices. Real estate prices generally fluctuate as per three parameters: demand-supply ratio, site location and the perception of the prime purchaser.

Real estate in Hyderabad has fared positively on all three counts. For the last two or three years, Hyderabad has seen an unprecedented demand for land,spurred by the arrival of IT and ITES companies. The growth of the IT industry has not only increased demand for both office spaces for the companies and residences for their employees , but has also catalyzed the growth of the retail space segment.

Demand for land has clearly far outstripped the supply, thus pushing up land values in pockets earmarked as the IT corridor and the nearest developed areas. Besides, with plans for the International Airport , Fab City, Outer Ring Road and Greater Hyderabad all gradually taking concrete shape, the perception that Hyderabad is happening is gaining currency nationwide, among multinational companies as well as developers.

As a natural corollary, land values in areas close to these are which figure high in plans for Greater Hyderabad have seen a sharp rise in prices.

This price rise is not completely new. Traditionally investing in land at Hyderabad has always been an attractive proposition, with an annual growth rate of about 15-25 percent. However, over the last three years, the rate has increased to a more robust 30-40 per cent. Experts cite several reasons for this above average growth rate.

M L Rao, Equate Consultants says political stability and an industry-friendly environment are the biggest drivers for real estate growth anywhere; the State has been fortunate on both counts, despite the change in the Government. So strong has the positive sentiment been that real estate prices that had been rising steadily till the N Chandrababu Naidu government fell, did not dip but merely stabilized after the Y S Rajasekhara Reddy government came to power.

With the fall of the N Chandrababu Naidu government and the emergence of the TRS as a popular entity, and the farmer friendly image the Congress government rode to power , real estate rates in the city plummeted by nearly15-20 percent.

Hyderabad wouldn’t be a `happening’ place, people feared. However, most developers adopted a wait and watch policy and simply sat on their land banks, refusing to sell at the low rates that consumers demanded. Developers were quick to admit that very few transactions actually took place during that time.

Land prices on the Srisailam, Warangal and Vijayawada highways suffered the worst dropping as much as 20-25 percent, on fears that Telangana would take Hyderabad with it. But not for long. Those who dared to wait have did actually tide over the crisis and are now catching the wave on the rise.

The decimation of the TRS in the municipal polls, coupled with healthy monsoons , reinforced the feel good factor and was immediately reflected in the land rates surging by as much as 25-30 per cent between September and December 2005.

Besides a stable government and excellent infrastructure, Hyderabad boasts of a reasonably comfortable power position and of development plans initiated by the Government that can only improve infrastructure facilities in a planned manner.

In addition to the increasing number of high net worth individuals and double income families, profits from the booming stock market and real estate business are being pumped into real estate industry itself. Sources also reveal that a large chunk of funds, to the tune of Rs 10,000 crores, that were allotted to contractors as advances for irrigation projects in the State are also making way into the real estate market.

With so much cash freely flowing in,it is clearly a sellers market, leading to unprecedented rates. In fact though the market has seen a 100 per cent rise in prices in the last 18 months, realtors say this is only the tip of the iceberg.

They say that by 2008, certain pockets of the city such as lands close to ORR Phase 1, Gachibowli, Vattinagulapally , Khajaguda, Manikonda, Nadagulla and Tellapur could well see another 100 percent hike. Other parts of the city such as Kukatpally , Kompally, Vijayawada and Mumbai Highways which have so far witnessed 30 per cent increase in the last 18 months, will see at least 40-60 percent increase in the next year and a half.

There will be no dip, experts predict. That must be music to those who have already invested, and is a wake up call to all those who havent, so far.
Private companies, foreign investors, domestic investors and even the state government are all realizing the immense potential in Hyderabad’s real estate market. Thanks to the state government, the city has become a favored destination for foreign investors and large corporate houses. The Hyderabad realty market has never been so good in Hyderabad for real estate investors The state government must step in to check such cases so that the benefits of the real estate market can be shared by all.

Hyderabad reality on high rise

By M H AHSAN

Hyderabad is India’s 6th largest metropolis and the 40th largest metropolitan area in the world, with more than 6.1 million people making it a happening place. The IT sector of Hyderabad had spelled bound investors and realtors and not for nothing, the 1500 acre IT Park at Secunderabad has made almost 50% IT buyers in the real estate boom.

Hyderabad has never had it so good. Its real estate prices in fact have never been this high in the last decade. If there is one indication that a city is growing and boasts of a booming economy with promise of more to come, it is in the demand for real estate and the price it commands.

Along with the boom in the number of IT and ITES companies in Hyderabad, the city is also witnessing a corresponding boom in its realty prices. Real estate prices generally fluctuate as per three parameters: demand-supply ratio, site location and the perception of the prime purchaser.

Real estate in Hyderabad has fared positively on all three counts. For the last two or three years, Hyderabad has seen an unprecedented demand for land,spurred by the arrival of IT and ITES companies. The growth of the IT industry has not only increased demand for both office spaces for the companies and residences for their employees , but has also catalyzed the growth of the retail space segment.

Demand for land has clearly far outstripped the supply, thus pushing up land values in pockets earmarked as the IT corridor and the nearest developed areas. Besides, with plans for the International Airport , Fab City, Outer Ring Road and Greater Hyderabad all gradually taking concrete shape, the perception that Hyderabad is happening is gaining currency nationwide, among multinational companies as well as developers.

As a natural corollary, land values in areas close to these are which figure high in plans for Greater Hyderabad have seen a sharp rise in prices.

This price rise is not completely new. Traditionally investing in land at Hyderabad has always been an attractive proposition, with an annual growth rate of about 15-25 percent. However, over the last three years, the rate has increased to a more robust 30-40 per cent. Experts cite several reasons for this above average growth rate.

M L Rao, Equate Consultants says political stability and an industry-friendly environment are the biggest drivers for real estate growth anywhere; the State has been fortunate on both counts, despite the change in the Government. So strong has the positive sentiment been that real estate prices that had been rising steadily till the N Chandrababu Naidu government fell, did not dip but merely stabilized after the Y S Rajasekhara Reddy government came to power.

With the fall of the N Chandrababu Naidu government and the emergence of the TRS as a popular entity, and the farmer friendly image the Congress government rode to power , real estate rates in the city plummeted by nearly15-20 percent.

Hyderabad wouldn’t be a `happening’ place, people feared. However, most developers adopted a wait and watch policy and simply sat on their land banks, refusing to sell at the low rates that consumers demanded. Developers were quick to admit that very few transactions actually took place during that time.

Land prices on the Srisailam, Warangal and Vijayawada highways suffered the worst dropping as much as 20-25 percent, on fears that Telangana would take Hyderabad with it. But not for long. Those who dared to wait have did actually tide over the crisis and are now catching the wave on the rise.

The decimation of the TRS in the municipal polls, coupled with healthy monsoons , reinforced the feel good factor and was immediately reflected in the land rates surging by as much as 25-30 per cent between September and December 2005.

Besides a stable government and excellent infrastructure, Hyderabad boasts of a reasonably comfortable power position and of development plans initiated by the Government that can only improve infrastructure facilities in a planned manner.

In addition to the increasing number of high net worth individuals and double income families, profits from the booming stock market and real estate business are being pumped into real estate industry itself. Sources also reveal that a large chunk of funds, to the tune of Rs 10,000 crores, that were allotted to contractors as advances for irrigation projects in the State are also making way into the real estate market.

With so much cash freely flowing in,it is clearly a sellers market, leading to unprecedented rates. In fact though the market has seen a 100 per cent rise in prices in the last 18 months, realtors say this is only the tip of the iceberg.

They say that by 2008, certain pockets of the city such as lands close to ORR Phase 1, Gachibowli, Vattinagulapally , Khajaguda, Manikonda, Nadagulla and Tellapur could well see another 100 percent hike. Other parts of the city such as Kukatpally , Kompally, Vijayawada and Mumbai Highways which have so far witnessed 30 per cent increase in the last 18 months, will see at least 40-60 percent increase in the next year and a half.

There will be no dip, experts predict. That must be music to those who have already invested, and is a wake up call to all those who havent, so far.
Private companies, foreign investors, domestic investors and even the state government are all realizing the immense potential in Hyderabad’s real estate market. Thanks to the state government, the city has become a favored destination for foreign investors and large corporate houses. The Hyderabad realty market has never been so good in Hyderabad for real estate investors The state government must step in to check such cases so that the benefits of the real estate market can be shared by all.