Where the hearts never met

Andhra had inherited the administrative system of the old Madras Presidency as introduced by the British since the mid-17th century. Madras was one of the earliest to come under the British. Since 1919,its bureaucracy had worked under elected political representatives,and after Independence,it had a full-fledged democratic system. Telugus in Madras had a vigorous social and political presence and produced stalwarts of freedom struggle and social reform.

In contrast,Hyderabad (also called Telangana) was a medieval state,which in 1798,had signed the Subsidiary Alliance Treaty to become a vassal state of the East India Company. It was controlled by British Residents who allowed nominal internal autonomy to the Nizam. The democratic system in Hyderabad started functioning only in 1952. Before that,its citizens were not familiar with civil liberties of British India. The level of political activity was highly circumscribed. The official language of the state and the medium of instruction up to the university level was Urdu. English was introduced only after integration with India in 1948.

Hyderabad was a prize capital for c. It was founded in 1591 as a “replica of heaven” by Mohammad Quli,the poet-king of Golkonda. Less than three square km of habitation was surrounded by about 23 square km of vegetation. Foreign chroniclers like Moreland,Tavernier and Manucci from the 17th century considered it better than the Mughal cities of Agra and Lahore.

After the great floods of 1908,there was planned development based on the recommendations of the eminent engineer Visweswarayya. A number of public buildings were constructed and broad concrete roads laid by the last Nizam,Osman Ali Khan. The city became so beautiful that it began to be referred to as uroos-ul-balaad (bride amongst cities) by Urdu poets from all over India. More than six centuries of unbroken Muslim rule till 1948 had given it a deep Islamic imprint. The population spoke Telugu,Kannada,Marathi,and Urdu. That,combined with a Hindu majority and a Muslim ruler,gave it a composite or Ganga-Jamuni culture. The palaces and deodhis of the nobles were still intact. The dying embers of the feudal order lit up the evenings with soirées with Mughlai cuisine and mushairas. The city cast a spell from which,as Sarojini Naidu put it,none could escape. And none did. Indeed none does even now.

So when Andhra Pradesh was enlarged by adding nine districts of the Hyderabad state to it,there was euphoria amongst the people of Seemandhra. In contrast,the leaders of Telangana worried that they would be “colonised” by people from Andhra.

Their apprehensions were assuaged by evolving a “Gentlemen’s Agreement” embodying 14 safeguards for Telangana. For example,it provided that if the chief minister of the new state was from one region,his deputy would be from the other. Further,there would be a Regional Council for Telangana to ensure its all-round development.

Allegations of the breach of safeguards cropped up soon after the creation of Andhra Pradesh. The first Telangana agitation erupted in 1969. In the former Hyderabad state,‘Mulki rules’ promulgated in 1919 closed all government jobs to persons from the Andhra area. When challenged,the Supreme Court upheld their validity. Incensed by the denial of jobs in their own state,Andhra employees started the ‘Jai Andhra’ agitation in 1972. The government doused the flames through the statutory Six-Point Formula in 1973 and amendment of the Constitution in 1974. They proved only temporary palliatives.

In the state secretariat,Seemandhra (Andhra plus Rayalseema) officers had a lunch room patterned after the Madras system. The Hyderabad officers used to have lunch in different officers’ ante-rooms. There,one could gauge the depth of hostility between the two camps. Derogatory comments about lack of work culture and social manners were made by each against the other. Witnessing the goings-on in the two camps,one could not escape the conclusion that as at the political level,so at the administrative level,their hearts never met. How long could such a union last?

Meanwhile,rich entrepreneurs from coastal Andhra invested in real estate and other ventures in Hyderabad. For decades,Hyderabad experienced one of the highest in-migration in India. People from Seemandhra took pride in the story of Hyderabad to which they were themselves contributing now.

From beneath the calm surface,the lava erupted again in 2001 when K Chandrasekhar Rao,a disgruntled Telangana leader of the Telugu Desam Party,revived the demand for a separate Telangana state. After a long period of dilly-dallying,the Congress high command,presumably fearing the adverse impact of the continued stalemate on the 2014 elections,suddenly announced its acceptance of the proposal for Telangana.

It was a bombshell for the people of Seemandhra. They feel betrayed. More than anything else,they bemoan the loss of the capital for the growth of which they have toiled for two generations. They had sat on the bench in the Mecca Masjid and drunk the water of Osman Sagar. According to popular belief,whoever does that settles down in Hyderabad. What happened to that promise?

While there is jubilation in Telangana,there is hurt,anger and frustration in Seemandhra. 2013 is a mirror image of 1956.

The epitaph on the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh will be: “Their hearts never met”.