Telangana must allay Andhra apprehensions
The Government of Telangana has said that the massive one-day Intensive Household Survey it conducted on Tuesday was designed to identify the legitimate residents of the State and thus ensure that state benefits went to the targeted groups and not elsewhere. To this extent, the intent cannot be faulted. After the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh and the creation of the Telangana State, there is a large mass of people out there, especially in Hyderabad which is the shared capital of both Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, who could be from either of the two States. Telangana would naturally not want its resources to be misdirected, and would be wary of criticism from its people if that were to happen. The survey provides the Government the statistical material on the basis of which it can plan welfare schemes for its people. This would include a gamut of sectors, from health to education to employment. The Telangana regime was reportedly alarmed by the figure that there were more ration cards than the listed beneficiaries in the newly-formed State. But there are also concerns which have been expressed over the ‘real’ motive behind the survey, and many of these apprehensions have come up as a result of the prevailing environment of distrust that unfortunately exists between the peoples of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana who share the same language and culture. That distrust, in turn has been fomented, willingly or inadvertently, by certain statements which have come from senior leaders of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi which rules the State. One statement appeared to have threatened Andhra residents with retribution; another said non-Telangana people in Government service would be thrown out, and so on. The fact that the Telangana regime point-blank refused to honour the commitment of the earlier unified Andhra Pradesh Government for scholarships to students (who now did not belong to Telangana) did little to contribute to an atmosphere of bonhomie.
The Government has clarified that it has no intention of being revengeful, but the TRS's aggressive approach has unsettled many. Residents of Andhra Pradesh, particularly in the shared capital of Hyderabad, believe that they are being targeted, and feel that the survey is meant to single them out of the crowd and thereafter hound them. It is for the State Government and Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao to allay those fears. One way of doing this is to strike a better working partnership with the Government of Andhra Pradesh. As things stand, both Mr Rao and his Andhra Pradesh counterpart Chandrababu Naidu share at best a frosty relationship.
To an extent, the Telangana Government had sought to rest fears by dropping a contentious entry in the survey document on ‘nativity'. The column in the survey paper was meant to elicit information on people who had migrated from other States, the language they spoke, and such other details. This was clearly a divisive move. Yet, doubts remain. Meanwhile, the Telangana Government must ensure that the database it will develop through the findings of the survey is not used for nefarious purposes; it could fall in the wrong hands and be exploited for dubious profiling.