Even as the BJP was mobilising its supporters across the State to make its “Hyderabad liberation Day” celebrations on September 17 a big success, the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) has taken a categorical stand that the day was not a “liberation Day” but only a merger day.
BJP has organised Tiranga Yatras or “Flag Marches” across the State in the run up to the main program on September 17 to be addressed by the party president Amit Shah in Warangal.
Senior BJP leaders including the Union Minister for Urban Development M Venkaiah Naidu, who participated in the Tiranga Yatra at different places have demanded the TRS Government in Telangana to officially celebrate the day to mark the liberation of Hyderabad from the rule of Nizam.
However the outspoken TRS MP and Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao’s daughter K Kavitha has categorically rejected the demand.
In a sharp attack on the BJP she said that the party was raising the demand as part of its “divisive politics”.
She also alleged that there was an “Andhra conspiracy” behind BJP’s demand for observing “liberation Day” officially. “By raising this issue the BJP leaders want to create a rift between Hindus and Muslims in the State”, she said.
She was reacting to the statement of senior BJP leader Venkaiah Naidu, who belongs to Andhra Pradesh, that the Telangana Government should officially celebrate the day. Pointing out that people all over the country had achieved and celebrate Independence from British rule on August 15, 1947, the people of Hyderabad State had to wait till September 17, 1948 for the liberation from the “tyrannical rule of Nizam” and integration with India, Venkaiah Naidu wanted Telangana Government to celebrate the occasion officially.
He also advised the TRS Government no to link it to vote bank politics. “it is unfortunate some political parties view even matters relating to the nation’s integrity through the prism of vote-bank politics,” he said.
BJP General Secretary N Indrasena Reddy also targeted the TRS Government saying it had gone back on its promise to celebrate the liberation Day as it was scared of Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen.
Reacting strongly to the BJP leaders’ statement Kavitha said, that TRS had always celebrated the day as “Merger Day” as the Hyderabad state had merged in to Indian union on the day.
“Moderate Telangana people do not believe in the liberation Day. We believe in a day where Telangana was merged in to Indian Union”, she said pointing out that during the Telangana State movement also the TRS celebrated the day and hoisted the national flag. “But then the BJP’s view of thinking about it as liberation from the Nizam rule does not have greater acceptance in Telangana society”.
Kavitha said that the TRS will certainly acknowledge and celerbate the day as a merger day. In a direct attack on the BJP, the member of lok Sabha from Nizamabad said, “they always call it liberation Day because it was under Muslim rule. We will not accept that”.
She countered the BJP propaganda by asking why the party failed to create Telangana state when it was in power at the Center. “had the BJP formed Telangana state when its NDA government was in power earlier, in accordance with the Kakinada resolution, so many youngsters of the region would not have laid down their lives for the state of Telangana”, she said.
Significantly Kavitha is the only senior TRS leader to take the BJP’s bull by horn on the issue
For many years the BJP has been raising the emotional pitch over the issue of liberation Day attacking the “tyrannical and oppressive rule” of the Asaf Jahi rulers, urging the successive governments to organize the celebrations officially.
The last time it had aggressively espoused the cause was in 2004 during the tenure of YS Rajaskehar Reddy and its leaders had made a big show of forcing their way in to the Secunderabad Parade Grounds to hoist the national flag.
However gradually the issue was put on the back burner.
Now again it has come to the forefront as the BJP was trying to galvanise its rank and file and emerge as a strong political alternative to the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samiti ahead of 2019 polls.