Congress President Sonia Gandhi is set to receive a special birthday gift on 9 December this year: A gift-wrapped Telangana. Party managers are now virtually racing against time to meet the deadline for introduction of a bill on formation of Telangana state in Parliament. However, one key leader who does not want to join the birthday party is Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy.
He has vowed not to allow the state to be cut into pieces like a birthday cake. By revolting against the party’s decision to carve out a separate Telangana state and projecting himself as a champion of the cause of united AP, Kiran Reddy has clearly crossed the ‘Lakshman Rekha‘ and is likely to pay the price for it.
The chief minister has been summoned by the high command to participate in the party’s coordination committee meeting on Friday, triggering speculation in political circles about a possible change of guard to ensure smooth completion of the bifurcation process. Kiran will be visiting the national capital after a gap of 45 days, a period that saw open defiance and belligerent utterances by him against the UPA leadership’s decision to split the state.
The Friday meeting of the coordination committee is expected to be crucial for his political future. “The Chief Minister will be told clearly to fall in line and cooperate with the Centre in the smooth division of Andhra Pradesh. There will be serious repercussions if he continues to be defiant,” a senior AICC leader said. However, sources close to the Chief Minister say that he would strongly pitch for keeping the state united and make it clear that he would not preside over the division under any circumstances.
Kiran has already petitioned President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, bypassing the party channels, seeking their intervention to ensure that “constitutional conventions and procedures” are followed while dividing the state. He and his supporters from Seemandhra, have been insisting that the Telangana resolution and the draft bill should be sent to the Assembly for clearance. The strategy of the 53-year-old cricketer-turned-politician is to put the draft bill for voting, get it defeated on the floor of the Assembly and thereby send across a strong message to the Centre.
However, the UPA leadership has other ideas. It has made it clear that the draft bill will be sent to the Assembly only to seek its opinion which will not be binding on the Centre. Brushing aside the bitter division among parties in the state, the Centre has pressed the fast forward button on the bifurcation process. According to the road map, the seven-member Group of Ministers (GoM) on Telangana will formulate the draft bill by the middle of November and send it to the Union Cabinet.
After the cabinet nod, the draft bill will be sent to the President who will in turn refer it to the Assembly, seeking its opinion under article 3 of the constitution within a specific time-frame. The plans are on to introduce the bill or if possible get it passed by the Parliament on 9 December, coinciding with Sonia’s birthday. Helping the UPA along the fast track is the Andhra Pradesh high court, which dismissed a Public Interest Litigation opposing the decision of the Centre to bifurcate AP. A division bench headed by Chief Justice Kalyan Jyoti Sengupta held that the President can under no circumstances be restrained by any court and not even by the Parliament.
The petitioner PV Krishnaiah, a city-based advocate, wanted the court to restrain the President from exercising his power under Article 3 of the Constitution, in pursuance of any recommendation made by the Union Cabinet regarding bifurcation of the state. “We think this prayer cannot be entertained by the court at all, as it is an absolute constitutional power of the President, as enshrined in the Constitution,” the court ruled. For Sonia, Telangana has been a promise waiting to be fulfilled.
It was a promise she made to the people of the backward region way back in 2004. Ironically, Kiran Reddy, who was personally picked by her to lead the state three years ago, has become a major hurdle in the way of bifurcation. The continued defiance of Kiran over Telangana issue has, however, put the party in a fix. If the central leadership makes an exception to its present policy of not changing its horses mid-way on disciplinary grounds, Kiran will have to blame himself for it.
The developments in the last few weeks suggest that he has made up his mind to go down as a political martyr for the cause of integrated state. What made the matters worse in the ongoing battle of wits was the Chief Minister’s missive in the form of strongly-worded letters to the President and Prime Minister, questioning the wisdom of the Congress Working Committee (CWC) and union cabinet in deciding to divide the state. The tone and tenor of the letters, with strong words like ”undemocratic, undue haste and utter disregard to the concerns and aspirations of the majority of the people”, have caused a deep sense of consternation in the party circles.
Kiran has emerged as a rallying point for the party’s Seemandhra leaders. “He is our star batsman defending the cause of unity. We will do everything in our means to defeat the attempts to divide the state,” says Lagadapati Rajagopal, a flamboyant Congress MP from the coastal city of Vijayawada and a key supporter of the Chief Minister. However, with the UPA government making it amply clear that there would be no going back on the creation of Telangana, several Union and State Ministers from Seemandhra have resigned themselves to the inevitability of the division and started lobbying for a better deal for the region. “I do not want to live a fool’s paradise and continue to sing Samaikyandhra (united AP) tune.
It is time to strive for protecting the interests of the people of Seemandhra,” said the State Endowments Minister from Rayalaseema, C Ramachandraiah. Understandably, Congress leaders from Telangana have reacted furiously to the rebellious acts of the Chief Minister and demanded his immediate dismissal. “We do not even consider him as our Chief Minister. He is behaving more like a CM of Seemandhra rather than for the whole state,” said Ponnam Prabhakar, an MP from Telangana’s Karimnagar.
“How can he rebel against the party leadership after being part of the consultation process for so long and after assuring to abide by the final decision of the party?,” wondered Kiran’s cabinet colleague from Telangana D Sridhar Babu. It remains to be seen whether Kiran, the captain on the ground presently availing strategic time-out, exercises his right to declare the innings or wait for the message from the dressing room.
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