Vision for Fabulous Future
An Approach paper
(Inclusive Development for Equity and Social Justice)
2014
Prof K.S.Chalam
Chairman, TSDF
We have drafted the approach paper on Teluguseema Development vision on behalf of the Telugu Seema Development Forum (TSDF) for Seemandhra 13 districts and released it in Hyderabad and Delhi. Copies of the same were sent to all political parties in Hyderabad and Delhi. The response was overwhelming and the academics mostly economists felt vindicated for the hard work put in by them in the preparation of the document. Several friends in Hyderabad and from districts of Telangana requested me to prepare similar document keeping in view the unique conditions of the new state. I have drafted the approach paper and added some of my papers published in ‘The Hans India’, daily and excerpts of TDIPC memo as appendix to provide background material.
This document is meant for a wide debate on the approach and the final view can be arrived at after due process of the deliberations.
Prof K.S.Chalam
Chairman, TSDF
TELANGANA
Development Vision for Equity and Social Justice
The state of Telangana is a reality now. The new government will ascend on the altar of power from 2nd June 2014. It is expected that the vision of the ruling dispensation should be different from that of their predecessors and be able to take the responsibility for sustained future of the state. There is no need to compare the status of the Seemandhra or some other states in designing its own process of development. It should be on its own terms as it is a unique region that attained statehood through democratic struggles based on its past history.
The area under the new state is 114840 Sq KMs spread in to 10 districts. The population as per 2011 census consist of 3.52 crores which was 41.6 per cent of the combined state. The per capita SDP of the state varies widely with the highest amount of Rs 99706 in Hyderabad and the lowest of Rs 47490 in Mahboobnagar, almost the same amount of Rs 47947 in Warangal and the remaining districts are found getting around Rs 53000 per capita per annum. There is vast variation in density among the districts ranging from 18480 persons per Sq Km in Hyderabad to the lowest of 170 persons per Sq Km in Adilabad and 175 in Khammam districts. The remaining districts fluctuatein between300 to 240 persons. Scheduled castes and tribes constitute around 24 per cent with OBCs at about 50 per cent of the population. Muslims in the state are found to be around 12 per cent, be like the national average, is unique in the South.(See appendix Tables)
There are some irritants like the hangover of struggle psyche of the people that need to be kept in mind by the government in designing models or approaches of development. In case the state fails to fulfil the aspirations and expectations of the people, it is likely that the persons who are well groomed in public protests would make it rebound. That is not good for the state and the people. Therefore, the future government must make all its moves transparent and democratic with people’s participation. There would always be disgruntled political elements who try to create problems and the political leadership would be intelligent enough to predict and tackle at their level in the larger interest of the disadvantaged. There are some vexed issues like long spells of feudal rule, under -development and exploitation of certain categories of people particularly after 1960s that should be kept in mind in designing programmes. The model of development followed so far in the combined state made Hyderabad city region vulnerable for all kinds of assaults that might impinge on the future prospects of the state. Yet, the resources and the revenue generated in the region could be productively utilised for the advancement of the new state.
Telangana has natural resources that are to be used for the development of the people. Some of the resources like coal, ore, water etc are to be imaginatively steered to get in return some scarce and core supplies for the foundation of innovative industrial development in different parts of the state. Land as real estate in the Hyderabad metropolitan region covering around 5ooo SqKms is the greatest asset of the state that should be imaginatively utilized .The human resources are not fully developed due to lack of quality educational institutions and those who have obtained some skills have migrated out of the state and are living elsewhere.
Justice B.N.Sri Krishna Committee has noted the weaknesses of the region in its report and is cited by noted Economist Ch.Hanumantharao in his papers. It is saidthat,” among the category of Medium and Large-ScaleIndustries in the state, 62% of companies were located in Telangana during theperiod 1991-2010. Out of those located in Telangana, as many as 75% were managed by Andhra entrepreneurs, the remaining 25% owned by those from Telangana. While Companies located in Telangana accounted for 56% of total employment generated,what is revealing is that as much as 75% of this employment generated in Telanganabelonged to Andhra youth, remaining 25% to the Telangana youth. As regardsSmall-Scale Industries till 2007, 56% of total employment was generated inTelangana. Out of this 70% belonged to Andhra youth, remaining 30% for Telanganayouth. A case study of Hyderabad Unit of Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited revealsthat in the category of General Managers and Executives, 80% to 90% belonged toSeemandhra. Even among the contract labour nearly two-thirds, and among staffand workers a little over half belonged to Seemandhra. As for the software industryin Hyderabad, the local youth do not constitute even 5% of total employment. Whatis more disturbing, there are glaring instances of transporting and dumping thehazardous wastes from as far as Visakhapatnam and its neighbouring areas to theoutskirts of Hyderabad – that too in the encroached government land!The above narration explains the paradox of high GSDP growth rate experienced inTelangana coexisting with mass discontent and strong demand for separatestatehood. What is at issue, therefore, is not whether growth has been taking place,but how the benefits of growth are being shared by different sections of people.”
The Approach to Inclusive Development
Thus, the rate of growth of SDP is not so much important for the new state compared to its accent on inclusion of groups and castes that have remained peripheral to development so far. That does not mean the state adopts the so called Hindu rate of growth, but espouses its own pace that corresponds to its resources and needs. The Planning Commission in its approach to XI and XII plans has focused on Inclusive growth. It has also noted the factors responsible for divisions and despair among people. But, the targets set by the commission seem to have not been achieved due to improper methods of strategies and the wide disparities prevailing across the states. But, Telangana has an advantage of being small in size and uniform in its geographical reach of different groups of people. The ten districts are placed in such proximity that it is possible to reachany place within few hours. It is here the state needs the improved infrastructure such as good motorable roads, quality educational institutions, skill development, power, irrigation projects, air ports, linkagewith coastal areas for ports and related schemes are essential to bring in rapid and sustainable development.
Telangana is recorded in the history as one of the states that witnessed armed struggle in the past and democratic movements in recent years to achieve a people’s oriented development that limits its focuson SDPgrowth. The wealth created in the region and the value of assets particularly in the Hyderabad region are said to be adequate to take care of the initial investment of development project. It is brought out by Economists in recent publications that the reduction in inequalities and participation of people in development process would quicken the rates of Economic Growth. It is further emphasised that the socio-economic structure of Telangana being caste and class based with a long record of feudal experience, the people are more conscious of their rights and forms of injustice. Therefore, the development model or approach could be in the form of a reform agenda through social and economic inclusion under the means of people’s participation with stress on responsibilities for the activists. The orientation should be on equity and justice in real terms of addressing the issues of an emerging new state. There can be a separate wing to continuously undertake dialogue with people and monitor development.(For more analytical papers refer to Appendix)
Land tenure and Agricultural Development
The land tenure in Telangana or the erstwhile Hyderabad state is different from the rest of the country or Andhra as it has remained outside British domain till 1948. It is neither Zamindari nor Munsabdari but Jagirdari with rights to cultivate lands for the raiyats.
In 1855 Salarjang introduced his first administrative reform byappointing paid Talukdars (Collectors), in the place of contractors or revenue farmers. The ‘Zilabandi’ System was introduced in 1865. The State was divided into fourteen districts. Each zila (District) was headed by aAwalTalukdar (District- Collector). He was assisted by DoyumTalukdars who roughly corresponded to sub-collectors in British India. The third category of officials was known as SoyumTalukdars, who corresponded to Tahsildars of British India.
In order to protect the interest of the tillers and bring equityin agriculture, the Government gave top priority to Land Reforms which included abolition of intermediaries, tenancy reforms, imposition of ceilings onlandholdings, distribution of surplus land, allotment of Government land,consolidation of holdings and protection of lands of Scheduled castes and Tribes. The Government of Andhra Pradesh made a provision in A.P. LandReforms (Ceiling on agricultural Holdings) Act, 1973 that as far as practicable not less than one half of the total extent of Ceiling Surplus Land vested inGovernment shall be allotted or transferred to the members of the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and weaker sections including Muslims. It has its impact on the land holdings of people in the Telangana region before formation of the state in 2014.
The average operational holdings in Telangana now stand at 1.3 Hectares. However 39.2 per cent of the holdings are less than 2 Hac and more than 5 Hacs constitute 46.6 per cent and the rest are above 10 Hacsof the total holdings. Unlike in the Coastal Andhra Pradesh, fallow lands in Telnagana were not brought under cultivation over the years. Out of 11478100 Hectares of geographical area of the present state, 5019535 Hectares or only 43 per cent lands are under cultivation. But, Telangana has vast areas under forest, covering around 29 lakh Hectares and leaving only around 85.65 lakh Hcs for cultivation. Out of which only 50.19 lakh Hcsare now being put to use. Further, the geographical distribution of lands is not uniform. Out of 10 districts, Mahbubnagar,Karimnagar,Nalgonda, Warangal and Adilabad are at a different holdings regime compared to others. The extent of lands in Medak, RangaReddy, Mahboobnagar and Nalgonda or the Hyderabad Metropolitan region has more unused areas than the rest due to typical tenures that are under litigation. Telangana has another dimension to the holdings as some areas come under the fifth schedule (Tribal) with different traditional type ownership that needs to be resolved for bringing the Adivasis under an inclusive development model.
Telangana being part of the Deccan traps has dry land as well as fallows and cultivable waste. There are pockets that depend entirely on rain fed and tank irrigation. The Nizams have developed several strategies to provide irrigation water for cultivation that are being made inoperative now. It is noted by the SriKrishna committee that tanks have provided irrigation to 4.48 lakh hectares in 1955-56 and has come down to 2.53 lakh Hcs by 2005-6. Wells used to provide irrigation water to 0.8 lakh hectares in the year 1956 has substantially increased by 2008-9 to 15.6 lakh hectares, reducing dependency on tanks. However, the proportion of SDP from agriculture has remained around 24 per cent in 2005 and in fact got reduced from 27 per cent from 1993. 63.2 per cent of the population of the state still depends on agriculture varying from 72 per cent in Khammam to 40.5 per cent in RangaReddy and 57 per cent in Nizamabad districts.
The status of agriculture noted above clearly shows that agriculture would continue to be the major source of living for the people particularly in the rural areas. Therefore, the per capita agriculture output should be raised from the present Rs 20200 average per hectare to a reasonable level (Coastal A.P Rs33000) to improve the living standards of people. The rice yield in Telangana is 3160 KGs per Hac compared to 3474 KGs in Coastal Andhra while the yields are higher in groundnut (1573Kgs).The yields of traditional crops like Jowar, maize, bajra are low .It is necessary to continue the subsidised power for agricultural use and slowly develop tank irrigation by desilting and augmentation from unauthorised occupation of tanks to meet the short term demand for water. Since canal irrigation through the Godavari and Krishna basin works and even Pranahita -Chevellamay take longer time that involve litigations, it is necessary to develop short term strategies to overcome the immediate demand. Together with the plans for water, land reforms in the form of evicting the illegal occupants and absentee land lords from overpowering arable lands of rightful owners of weaker sections are imminent. Telangana has a different kind of ownership and the landlessness of Dalits is very less compared to coastal Andhra on record. It is necessary to restore the lands to the legitimate owners and introduce reform measures to give tenure rights to the tillers that bring benefits ofpolicy to people in the new state. This is a prerequisite for giving confidence to the tillers and to increase productivity on the lands cultivated by farmers.
Selection of crops based on the quality of soil is important. It is observed that many farmers are shifting to cotton with market inducement of corporate houses and later landed in trouble including resorting to suicides. Telangana used to cultivate traditional crops like maize, jowar, bajra, ragi and rice, has now slowly shifted to a single food crop, paddy and other cash crops. The closure of Nizam sugars and textiles might have a cascading effect on crops, but this needs to be studied and remedial measures are to be initiated. The Northern districts are close to Nagpur region where orange and other horticulture crops are made popular can be tried here with state support and subsidies from the Ministry of Food and Agro-processing of government of India. Different agricultural Colleges are to be located in the select districts exclusively devoted to provide technical support to farmers. Diversity in agriculturalcrops, seeds, farm management techniques and advanced technology should be provided to farmers to improve their productivity. Subsidised farm inputs should be extended as incentives to bring small and marginal farmersboth to get remunerative prices and attract youth in to the sector as measures of inclusivegrowth under state supervision.
Human Resources Development
Education and skill formation have suffered a serious break in Telangana due to the feudal suppression and relations. It seems there was no interruption with the situation even after the region joined Andhra Pradesh, as the educational institutions that came up in the area were either concentrated in and around Hyderabad city or owned by outsiders. This has negated the inclusive character of education programmes of the democratic governments and widened the inequity. Some of the traditional artisan castes like the Padmasali, Kummara, Perika, Viswabrahmin,Malasaleetc have been displaced from their occupation and migrated outside the state and country. Those who have remained and attached to the caste occupations could not upgrade their skills due to inadequate education and support from government. This has impacted the educational status of the state.
The literacy rate of the state has remained around 61.5 per cent with81 per cent in Hyderabad in 2011. The stock of educated in the state as per the Krishna committee is 8.3 percent of the population having a degree and abovequalifications and in Hyderabad they are at 17.7 per cent. Matriculates constitute only 24.8 per cent of the population. Thus, the qualifications are reflected in the occupational levels consisting of 9 per cent Professionals, 9 per cent craftsmen, Farming 24 per cent, trade 9 per cent and Non-agriculture category 24 per cent of the total in the state. This distribution is different in Hyderabad with 35 % each in professional and trade occupations and non-agriculture and crafts sectors having each 15 %. But, major chunk of the professional groups in Hyderabad came from outside Telangana.
The levels of learning of the children in schools in general and dalits and adivasis in particular are very low as they are restricted to government schools that are increasingly attended by these sections only. There is a need to develop the common school for everyone at the level of school education to bring in the awareness and feeling of unity and brotherhood among children.
Higher education in the state might have ushered in the 19thcentury and was consolidated with the establishment of Osmania University in 1918. But it has catered to the needs of the rich and elite of Telangana and the backwards and dalitshave derived very little from this, except few individuals. The same situation seems to have continued after 1956 and till the formation of the new state. It is interesting to notice that out of 286 Engineering colleges in Telangana,Hyderabad and RangaReddy districts have 152 colleges and the enrolment in the rest of Telangana is only 31483 out of 70 thousand seats. There are 12768 seats in MCA, a professional course that provides access to ICT jobs in the state. But only one third of the seats or 4336 are enrolled in rest of Telangana B.Ed,a poor man’s professional course has 26292 seats, out of which 18589 are from rest of Telangana excluding Hyderabad city.
Education and skills provide access to modern opportunities either in the public sector or private sector. It works as a level playing field for the poor and socially disadvantaged in a new state like Telangana. The state should concentrate on the provision of education particularly professional and vocational streams at the higher levels to all till the state reaches comparable levels with developed states. The state should make use of the central sponsored programmes like SarvaSiksha Abhiyan, Mid-day Meal for school education and RUSA for higher education to reduce the burden on the state budget.
It is necessary to undertake an exercise as to what kind of courses at what level are to be undertaken by the state to regulate admissions in the colleges and universities. The enrolments can be monitored and planned in relation to the kind of economic and industrial activities planned for the state. For instance, if the state wanted to get benefit from the large reservoir of Coal, it has to promote education and research in advanced areas with collaboration from a country like Australia that has advanced knowledge in the subject. School education is made compulsory up to the age group 14 ( RTE) and the state should put pressure on union government to fund schemes that include residential schools for all and particularly with reference to Adivasis, Muslims, Dalits and others who are found to be educationally backward up to college. Education is a prerequisite to undertake any reforms and therefore, it has to be planned in advance.
The outmigration of Telangana labour force seems to have drained the state with artisan skills such as fitters, turners, darners, mechanics, plumbers, electriciansetc who have obtained skills on their traditional occupations. There are very few technical institutes at the level of Polytechnics and ITIs and vocational schools, largely denting the availability of intermediary technical skills for industrialisation. Priority is to be given to these institutes with short term courses and skill development programmes to prepare the necessary human resources background to take on industrial development in the North and South districts. Hyderabad city has the largest number of Scientific and Research institutes whose output is not being productively utilized for the location of manufacturing units here. An R&D wing in the ministry of Industry is to be established to review and use the patents and research output for industrial growth in the hinterland of Hyderabad. Universities in the districts are to be developed with focus on the neighbourhood needs with expansion of afflicted college’s network and Osmania and Kakatiya are to be developed as national centres of excellence.
Human development includes health and nutrition. It is necessary to increase the enrolment in Medical and Nursery colleges to raise the doctor patient ratio or patient bed ratios in the rural areas. There should be sufficient medical and health facilities with free medicines to meet the requirements of poor and common man at the mandal level drawing funds both from NRHM and state budget. There are unique adivasi groups in Telangana, some of them in inaccessible areas and Muslims under some traditional health regimes. They are to be systematically studied and if possible improved with modern inputs like AYUSH. The proposed Adivasi University should have a separate wing for this.
Social Development
The ultimate aim of any development (plan) is to improve the welfare of the large sections of populations and the amelioration of the deprived. The Human Development Indicators of the socially disadvantaged must be taken into consideration for investments in the area of education, health, nutrition, etc to ensure social development. The culture of the state and its long historical roots are to be studied and strengthened to bring unity and harmony among different social groups and communities. There is however, an emerging trend that shows the formation of a middle class or petite bourgeois in the rural areas is very slow to stall any radical changes in policy. The clear division of society as rich and poor is so glaring that it is possible for the new government to bring harmony between the groups on a progressive agenda of development. The state should design its programmes in such a way that there will be minimum outmigration with sufficient scope for the prodigal to settle in Telangana.
Special Component Plan for Dalits
The Government of Andhra Pradesh is the first state in the country to have enacted a special Act No 1/2013 to formalize and legally enforceable measure to spend public expenditure (plan) in proportion to the representation of scheduled castes and tribes in AP that included Telangana districts. Therefore, it is necessary to frame Rules for implementation in the new state. The second most important success in the direction of socio-economic upliftment of dalits and adivasis in Andhra Pradesh is the passing of a separate budget allocation for these sections. It is time that the state should now concentrate on the deficiencies in the budget allocations for implementation of the Act in spirit and content. It is an important Act that brings all the socially and economically backward castes under one vision for drafting programmes for their development. The regular budget allocations in the non-plan budget for the social welfare department and tribal welfare should continue. It is also necessary, in the interest of the overall wellbeing of the society that the regular budget allocations for these sections are to be made part of the state’s responsibility. One should not get the feeling that the sub plan allocations are given to these sections is enough and they do not require any support from the regular budget. That will defeat the purpose and the legitimacy of a budget and the manifestation of the so called philosophy of Inclusive development with justice.
The following are some important issues that would be addressed in the new state.
1. There is a sealing of devoting one third of the budget for capital expenditure. This is a good idea, and that needs to be converted to practice by creating assets or providing subsidies for schemes like Industrial Investment, Skill development etc to realise measurable or quantifiable benefits.
2. A survey or study would be conducted on the needs of the Dalit sand ADIVASIS living in different locations with certain advantages and disadvantages to bring in as part of the strategy of development. For instance, in mining areas where they can be promoted to take up contract jobs and the sub plan funds can be utilized for that. In Agriculturally advanced areas, Mills and Cold storages, Godowns etc. will be earmarked for SCs/STs.
3. The items of expenditure divided in to 42 to 45 departments/ units seem to be not adequate to incorporate the dalits or adivasis requirements based on their local setting. Therefore, a separate unit will be established to devise strategies in collaboration with MSME/NGOs/trade associations.
4. Some of the allocations like sarvasikshaabhiyan, pradhamik and madhyamikaabhiyan, etc are central schemes and the funds would be shown as grants for these schemes from Delhi. SCP funds will be used for special schools or to pay the fees in the public schools etc and not to repeat the central schemes.
5. The allocations made under major Irrigation, AP Genco, rodent treatment, DWACRA grants,SHG ,pavalavaddi, etc will be used to improve the productivity of dalit and Adivasi entrepreneurs.
6. A proposal to spend 7 per cent on non-divisible is found in the allocations of the budget for A.P. Now in the new state a creative solution to the problem of non-divisible will be worked out as there is no work that cannot be converted in to monetary terms and is possible to bring it to the proportion of the 16.2 or 7per cent of populations in the total cost. For instance, the road on the Tank bund is found in the allocations of the sub plan funds with the argument that we cannot divide the road as 16.2 per cent and therefore 7 per cent is automatically charged to the cost or some amount under SCP funds. Is it not wise to convert the cost of the total project, as let us say Rs 100 crores and the dalits share can be no more than 16.2 crores. Economists know that there is shadow pricing where there are no established pricing mechanisms in new areas like say 4G/3G to arrive at costs or benefits. The same approaches would be used for SCP allocations.
7. The LIDCAP was totally destroyed would be revived now to provide opportunities to traditional workers who have hands on experience in the field with technical support from National Leather Research Institute etc
8. The allocations under Indiramma illu, pensions and other such schemes are government of India programmes. There is no doubt that separate provisions are shown under central and state share here, but we expect that the state share should be 16.2 per cent. The central share comes as part of 16 per cent of the government of India grant and may be reorganized to arrive at 16 per cent at the state level later.
9. The allocations under SCP are special for the development of the weaker sections and it does not mean that the expenditure on the people should be confined to 16.2 plus 7 per cent at any stage particularly at the district and sub-district level. As these sections are backward, the programmes should consider this as minimum and in areas where they are more than 20 per cent or otherwise, it is logical to extend the benefit further to fulfil the constitutional obligations towards these sections.
10. The Christian converts from dalit castes suffer from the same indignities as that of the dalits, though they are given BC C status. Therefore, all the benefits earmarked for SC/ST are to be extended to them.
It is necessary to specify in the rules of the Act that separate administrative wing or agency with a head at the level of Secretary and above be created to oversee the huge work load at the state and district levels. The district level work in course of time will be passed on to groups with involvement of NGOS BabasahebAmbedkar/BabuJagjivanram Associations. The SCP funds should also be used to rehabilitate the displaced persons from projects, Gulf immigrants, etc. by providing investment opportunities in the Industrial clusters/corridors and others.
Backward Castes Service Centres:
Telangana has a large chunk of artisan castes and other backward castes like fishermen, toddy tappers, smiths, weavers, sheep rearers and several others, who are not provided with enough support for their occupations to flourish and get socially and educationally included, will be hereafter given priority in the development policy with innovative schemes. Backward caste service centres to train and modernise the occupations of the backward castes will be taken up with support from Government of India and earmarking special budget for the groups. Priority will be given to the castes in sectors that are considered as the traditional fort of the castes including the Muslims. For instance, while giving loans for fishy (choice of words) culture, fishermen will be given first preference, weavers in Textiles, Yadavas in meat and dairy, Smith’s skills will be modernised, Barbers and Dhobis will be rehabilitated with special packages and so on. The poor and unorganised Muslim youth are languishing in the informal sectors without much progress are to be given special training both under PM 15 point programme and also by the state government to provide economic opportunities.
Development of Industrial Infrastructure
The industrial base of the state initiated by the Nizam’s through basic industrial units like Praga Tools, Alwynetc are ruined and the state has remained as an agrarian economy. However, Public sector units mostly the defence related manufacturing is located in Hyderabad and Medak districts with little spread effects to the region. It is necessary to study the possibility of developing intermediary goods that could be manufactured in the state to support the Defence industry. Telangana has an advantage of adequate lands not only in Hyderabad city region but also in the districts to locate industries including IT hardware that are complimentary to the manufacturing sectors here.
The roads network is poor particularly in connecting the rural and Adivasi areas to bring raw material and finished goods to the market centres. The agricultural marketing yards are inadequate to provide necessary warehousing and cold storage facilities in the districts that need immediate attention of the government. Good roads, rail links and air connectivity to important centres like Warangal, Karimnagar headquarters are to be developed for the free flow of men and material. It is necessary to connect the state with the neighbouring Nagpur corridor and to the Kolkatta Chennai Industrial corridor through the shortest routes of surface transport through National Highways.Nizampatnam port is the nearest point though Visakhapatnam has also connectivity via Khammam to conduct transactionsin internal and international trade. Though Nizampatnam is a part of the VANPIC undertaking of the erstwhile government, it can be negotiated with the new government for investments to be made by the state to develop it as a dedicated port for Telangana and with an eye on Visakhapatnam coast for future expansion and self-reliance.
The Government of Andhra Pradesh has drafted an Industrial Policy 2010-15 for the combined state has contained strategies to encourage MSME and other units in the state can be adopted here with some modifications. Telangana is advantageously located between the North and South Indian states could study the industrial needs of both the regions so that it could emerge as a buffer zone specialising in select industries like Biotechnology, new energy automobile industry with fuel efficient or fuel cell technologies and other machine tools, intermediary products that are in demand in both the regions. The combined state has failed to attract investments in the automobile sector though we have sufficient manpower resources with about 150 Engineering colleges, IIT, R&D institutes in Hyderabad. It is time that Telangana concentrates on the manufacturing sector with industrial clusters in select places and expands the ICT sector to small towns to create opportunities there.The farmers of the state have slowly shifted from cultivation of traditional crops to cotton and other crash crops without any processing units here. The textile workers are migrating to Surat and other places as there are no Mills here. The state should make efforts to locate some Textile Mills, manufacturing units with advanced technology through land and tax concessions in collaboration with the Central Ministry of Textiles. The industrial policy of the government should be aimed to provide job opportunities to the educated youth in the immediate future with a plan to upgrade the manufacturing units in the long run. The state would undertake a study in different districts of the state to locate manufacturing units and accordingly policies would be designed to invite FDIs and other investment opportunities. There are trade and Industry associations who are making plans for industrial development,could also be considered for discussion. The strategy should be state sponsored industrialisation rather than market or private investor’s paradise that would ultimately defeat the purpose of a new state with a difference.
Investment capital for industrial development is not a serious problem as the FDI in Hyderabad exceeded Rs 6500 crores in 2010 showing resilience, would be tapped further with an investment plan after identifying the sectors to be promoted in Telangana. There are private investors and joint ventures that can be harnessed to invest in the state withcandour by clearing projects as per 2010-15 policy. The necessary investor friendly environment would be created with infrastructure to promote industrial development with sufficient caution to take care of about the problems of finance capital.
Cultural Tourism
Telangana is proud of its culture and traditions that are deep rooted in its history and society. It is necessary to showcase the unique composite culture that has developed over a period of time with fusion of Arabic, Persian and Indian art, music, paintings etc. The archaeological finds of the state would be protected not only in Hyderabad, Warangal, Medak, Alampur, Bhadrachalam and other known centres but new excavations are to be ordered to bring out the historical significance of the Telugu or Sathavahana, Buddhist and other places of significance to attract tourists. The unique folk culture and Music along with the Adivasi artefacts are to be conserved and a cultural centre would be established to train artists to preserve Telangana identity. It is possible in the process to train some artists as cultural ambassadors to earn a living while conserving Telangana culture.
The above process of development in the newly created state of Telangana is addressed with a moderate agenda to make the state socially and economically inclusive. It is aimed to generate intellectual debate to arrive at a consensus on a policy direction for the state to achieve equity and social justice.
Appendix –II*
Historical Significance of Telangana in India
The people of Telangana are celebrating the formation of a new state while the politicians are quarrelling on different tactics of how to capture power. Yet, the whole world is watching what is in store for the people of the state who had a very exciting historical background in the recent past. One need not establish once again that they are distinct people with a different experience etc. But, one should not forget that the mother tongue is either Telugu and or Dakhini. It seems the unique dakhini language is more influenced by the alien or Indo-European than the Telugu unlike the Andhram or classical Telugu of dominant Seemandhra (it is an unsettled question to be debated). Some of our friends used to contend that the Andhras have taken loan words from Telangana to enrich their lingua franca, without looking at the fact that the court language itself was an offspring of Indo-Iranian. Though, it is the domain of the linguists to talk about it, as social observers it is necessary to know to what extent the new generation would protect the real Telangana people’s language or dialect spoken in the rural areas. The Adivasis (tribes) of Telangana like the Gonds and several others have their language identities submerged in the dominant court language/ Telugu might get some reprieve now.
Though, some Government Tribal Institutes, and departments of languages in universities are doing significant work, the new state would definitely throw some light on this problem. The outcomes of such efforts would become the common legacy of all of us. One of the important burden of duty or obligation of the Telangana Intellectuals and writers appears to be there, protecting and enriching the chaste Telugu and the folk (it should be called people’s) so rich in this state. They have an advantage now being an independent state to promote the people’s culture. Some linguists roughly say that Tamil and Malayalam are the same except that the accent and influence of Sanskrit is more in the latter. Does it result in an analogous situation with the formation of a new Telugu state? Personally I am against such drift.
A distinct identity is ascribed to the state not only due to culture and language, but also of the exuberant role of cultural troupes like Gaddar, Balakishan and others and writers like Kaloji, Jayashanakr in the Telangana movement. Nevertheless, it is beyond that. The recently concluded conference on Socialism and Telangana in Hyderabad brought out new visions before the leaders and builders of modern or new Telangana with social justice as an agenda. The subjects of Socialism, Social Democracy and Democratic Socialism as distinct categories are known to many. But, if the people of the new state wanted to build within the framework of the Constitution sincerely unlike others, there are sufficient provisions under Articles 38 and 39 and the preamble to guide them. The state had a chequered
*The papers included here were earlier published by K.S.Chalamin The Hans India, daily.
history with one of the oldest socio-economic revolutions to liberate the people from all kinds of dominance before and after independence. In fact, the people of the state are well entrenched in the quagmire of several struggles and are aware of the need for a different kind of development model inclusive of all social groups popularly voiced as SamjikaTelangana. The role of the left parties in the past and in the recent separate battle is remarkable that might remain as mainstay of people’s emancipation.
The world had witnessed different kinds of experiments with Socialism, Communism, Capitalism, Mixed Economy, and they are sufficiently echoed here. Further, they have also seen the experiments made with the above ideas in different states of India. In fact, one of the reasons that hastened the process of bifurcation according to some is the type of development pursued in the combined state and in Hyderabad city. Neo-liberalism does not care for your internal friction; it aims at surplus and moves on wherever it is possible. If there are any aberrations like poverty, inequality etc they can be tackled, the protagonists argue, through safety nets. This has created social upheaval; regional tensions, political breakdowns etc not only in Telangana in Andhra Pradesh, India, but in several third world countries. The creation of three new states often cited in debates is different, as they were small adivasi/ tribal clusters separated from the main states. But, the new state has a historical role to play, given its past history, social composition and resource base to show that it is different. It cannot afford to fail, lest the future record one more betrayal?
The peoples’ struggles including the left in Telangana are very significant issues to be reflected as phenomena of 21st century. The slogans of social justice and economic equity are to be analysed in the context of democracy, socialism and development. The democratic methods used in the movement to achieve separate state by integrating all marginalised groups in a region that has witnessed armed struggles, is not a mean achievement. It is precisely for this reason, the new state has a historical responsibility to make it a success otherwise; the experiment would look down as a failed model. The world cannot afford this now.
The population of the state is around 4 crores. This is much higher than any of the 26 odd Latin American countries (except Brazil, Mexico) where different kinds of models of development are in vogue now. Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, Peru and few others where the socio-economic conditions required them to adopt a variant of the kind economy India had about three decades ago. It is called as socialism in some and social democracy in others. But people are interested in Democratic Socialism as in Venezuela where the means of production is under the control of the state and workers are controlling the major chunk of the economy. Is it possible here?
The socio-economic conditions in Telangana in terms of low literacy rate, unique caste groups and Adivasis, who according to some activists, do not own property might pose serious complications. Then who are the owners of land and other assets to mobilise for the development of the state. The existence of natural resources alone is not sufficient to bring in development; we need capital and human resources. It should come either from the state out of its own surpluses or union government grants or by foreign investments. It is also possible by the voluntary contributions and sacrifices made by the proletariat of the former communist countries. Telangana had hidden treasure in the form of real estate property in Hyderabad city that belonged to the locals. It was alleged to have been slowly appropriated by outsiders could be harnessed, is sufficient to fund reconstruction of Telangana. However, it all depends on how the people look at the situation and the kind of upcoming government that might take reins of power and its ideological commitment.
The investment environment as projected by some is not vitiated and therefore the Brand value of Hyderabad is to be marketed not only for the city but also for other districts. The district per capita income of Adilabad(Rs32271), Nizamabad (Rs30608), Mahabubnagar(Rs29888) and Warangal (Rs28953) is lower than the combined state average. The industrial output is also lower in Warangal, Mahabubnagar and Nizamabad within the Telangana state. The Hyderabad city region has squeezed most of the resources of the neighbouring districts and did not allow any investment to percolate to the backward areas. If the agricultural income of Karimnagar, Medak, Nalgonda, Warangal and pockets of other districts is compared with the agricultural output per Hectare, it is only Rs20200 in Telangana compared to Rs 33000 in coastal Andhra. The cropped area in both the regions is almost the same 50 million Hcs (53 in Coastal). But Telangana has exhausted its ground water through well irrigation. This will be a serious threat to its sustenance in future, if the aquifers are not replenished.
Modernisation and diversification of agriculture seem to hold the key in meeting the immediate demand for jobs. It can be in the form of Operation Barga of Bengal as a transitory solution with the expansion of infrastructure of not only roads, buildings, power etc, but provision of education and skills to create more jobs. However, this is possible with the commitment of the government and sincerity of the bureaucracy with a socio-economic agenda of equality of opportunity. As the state has long reservoir of ideologically oriented political workers and development activists, it is possible to usher in a socialistic pattern of society with the active involvement of people as partners of development. Let us wish our Telugu brethren a joyful future
Both regions can benefit
The long-cherished dream of the people of Telangana is going to be a reality soon. The region will be demerged from the combined State after 56 years of cohabitation inflicting great pain and sentiment of separation. But, this is how States or nations do emerge and develop. This is not the time to reflect on our common culture and heritage as no one is physically isolated or rehabilitated elsewhere, as in partition. We continue to live and sail together enriching our common culture, language and future sharing our experiences and resources.
We may briefly reflect here on the economic status of the region. The Economic History of the region narrated by AdapaSatyanarayana, Ramakrishna Reddy, Thirumali, VasantBawa and others clearly shows that it had a distinct character different from others. It is really a puzzle how the Nizam accumulated so much of wealth in a land-locked region. It is revealed that the economic activity in the form of industrialisation was initiated by the State which got its resources through primitive accumulation. It was the Nizam who had invited outsiders to cultivate 40 lakh acres of barren land during the 1920s that helped create agricultural surplus for public investment.
Thus, the Nizam had developed a model to overcome the handicap of being an isolated province and not to solely rely on international trade. The authors have also explained how the “quartet of thugs” (dominant castes) bribed revenue officials to get their names entered in revenue records to transform as landowners.
Later, the Telangana armed struggle and the distribution of lands in the region along with other political developments made some of the Scheduled Castes, Tribes and OBCs landholders with average holdings higher than in Coastal Andhra. This character needs to be kept in mind while formulating economic programmes in the future State. The proportion of their population would also rise after readjustment of data.
There are several states in the country that are land-locked and under-developed. The so-called BIMARU States are land-locked (Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh). Even Punjab, Haryana and the Himalayan States have not benefitted from trade liberalisation. In fact, regional disparities have grown during the post-reform period as investments, FDIs, etc., are concentrated only on the coast and a few urban agglomerates.
Delhi is an exception being the National Capital City and politically a buffer between North and West. That is why the government is now developing a Delhi-Mumbai corridor for industrial growth. Telangana, being a land-locked State, needs to learn from the experiences of these states and from its distinct historical and social milieu. The city of Hyderabad was developed due to several land-related and socio-economic factors. The city has become a bone of contention among different interest groups of diverse geographical regions that are nearby and not the backward North Andhra, 900 kms away.
There seems to be a penchant among some leaders that the city can be developed as a growth centre to take care of the development of the entire region. We may draw their attention to the recent happenings in America and Europe where cities like Detroit have crumbled. There is no doubt that the city and its resources can be utilised for the development of rural Telangana. But, the city cannot be overextended beyond an optimum point that becomes counterproductive.
Further, the city has emerged as a centre of service sector, R and D that do not produce any tangible commodities but only weightless goods and software products. They do not need vessels or ships to export them from our borders to other countries. Satellites and Internet facilities are enough.
Another important factor that needs to be kept in mind is that the whole software business is based on some soft skills and advanced education and training. We are of the view (subject to correction) that the proportion of Telangana boys and girls in this sector is limited as they had inherited a weak higher education sector. As someone remarked recently, most of the engineering and professional colleges in the city are either under the control of minorities or ‘others’. Therefore, as late Jayashankar used to insist, educational institutions are to be given priority to prepare Telangana youth to take up greater responsibilities in future.
Some critiques allege that the city of Hyderabad did not allow people to reason out the conditions in the rural Telangana. The city and its extended region of Ranga Reddy, Medak, parts of Nalgonda have limited influence on the structure of development elsewhere. Interestingly, adjoining Mahboobnagar has remained one of the most backward.
The per capita SDP of Nizamabad, Adilabad, Mahboobnagar and even Warangal is less than the combined state SDP and Hyderabad (some districts in Seemandhra have the same worry). If we turn our attention to the prospects for agriculture, the size of holdings and water are important. It is noted that the average holdings in Telangana is much higher (2.4 ha) than coastal Andhra and top 5 per cent of the landholders possess 33% of the land. It is much higher in South Andhra.
The issue is that the landlords or big farmers in Telangana seem to have not used their surplus for industrialisation of the region. Perhaps they are lured by the glamour of Hyderabad and we may hope that they will now turn to industrialisation and manufacturing in the districts. The newly formed State, like that of the erstwhile Nizam, has a responsibility to sponsor not only industrialisation but also dispersal of industries to cater to the needs of backward districts in Telangana to realise the dreams of the disadvantaged.
There are plenty of opportunities in the State in terms of mineral and natural resources, including water, that need to be imaginatively augmented for its development. Interestingly, Telangana has slowly shifted to cotton by devoting around 30 per cent of its fertile land. The State had sufficient skill base in handlooms and textiles, but they were never effectively utilised. The raw cotton is exported to Tamil Nadu and yarn is imported making handloom and power looms very expensive that led to distress migration and suicide of weavers.
Further, it has to develop its roads and corridors to connect with the emerging International Air Cargo corridor in Nagpur (nearby) and to sea port in the neighbouring Prakasam/ Guntur of Coastal Andhra. This would provide sufficient scope to share its surplus resources in exchange for Coastal Andhra space and funds to come out of the handicap of land lock to grow together.
This is a win-win situation for both the regions to continue their legacy of brotherhood and inseparability in the years to come to display the prowess of Telugu culture.
Spiritual unity of Telugu people
We have witnessed the spirit (religious) of oneness recently in the queues in front of temples in all parts of the State, seeking blessings of the same gods to keep the State united or bifurcated. Spirituality as a transcendental dimension of human experience is precursor of organised religion. It was recorded or carried on as an oral tradition in different societies till very recently. However, there are still groups and individuals who consider their understanding of spirituality is superior to that of others. On the other hand, the concept of spirit is used in ordinary parlance to signify the essence of thought or metaphysically refer to the soul, occult experience, etc. Keeping the spirit of the matter, I wanted to cultivate the concept of Telugu spirituality and mooted the idea with a friend. He immediately retorted that I am not qualified to do so as I am a teetotaller and do not believe in spirits. There is no harm in claiming that Telugus are the original people of India, and in all probability due to its vastness (from BrahuiSindhuGanges and Kaveri), the language might be the proto-Dravidian language (linguists may differ). But, it is unusual to find that every dominant caste in the State claims (in their caste chronicles) that they have migrated from somewhere in the North or Rajasthan or UP or extreme South and none from the Telugu soil. It seems the stigma is carried from generation to generation and, at the time of outmigration, this character unconsciously dents the youngsters to be comfortable in the foreign language rather than in Telugu.
The recent upsurge of the so-called Telugu cultural extravaganza can be contrasted with the Bengal or Tamil or Sindhi assemblages which are more secular and essentially distinct culture-specific. For, the present geographical location of the Telugu State is unique in the country, perhaps indicating the ubiquitous nature of a vast
Telugu land unlike our brethren who have limited territory. It is our narrow mindset that limited our immensity by withdrawing from our claims over our expansive Telugu history and culture beyond the borders of our country in the past and also in the contemporary world.
However, it is time that an effort must be made to bring the distinctive Telugu culture as a universal category and not to be bothered about narrow specifics. This will be possible by attempting to bring out the spiritual unity among the Telugu people.
We have witnessed the spirit (religious) recently in the queues in front of temples in all parts of the State, seeking blessings of the same gods to keep the State united or bifurcated.
Different tongues close to Telugu are spoken in the East from Gangetic plains, Tamralipti, Mahanadi, Khandamaland in other places that have not been studied so far, according to Balasubrahmanyam(Odissa civil servant). It may be due to the prejudice of some scholars/pundits that Telugu does not exist beyond Godavari (restricting it to three districts). It is surmised that the aliens after reaching the Ganga found that it was formidable to cross Dandaka where most of the so-called Dravidian languages were spoken (currently practise).
They have approached the South through the East Coast crossing Mahendragiri and built Arasavilli (2nd century BC and rebuilt by DevendraVarma), the first Sun temple to record their entry into dakshinapath. The Lord Narasimha of Simhachalam (much senior to Tirupati) later crossed the Godavari and entered Dhramapuri in Telangana and helped the cult of Yadagiri (place). Without entering into the controversy of how Vaishnavism became popular in the South through Telugu country, one could see the contribution of Telugu Alwars, pundits and poets influencing the religious worldview of the common man.
The transition from Buddhism to Vaishnavism (marginalising Shaivism) seemed to be total by the time Krishna Devaraya ushered in Telugu (Tulu) land. The elite of the Telugus with the support of British India officers have established systematic and uniform methods of worship (with compromises between Pancharatra and Vaikhanasa) in all parts of the State.
Bhadrachalam built by KancharlaGopanna in 1630AD was regularised by the Muslim Tanisha later. Similarly, all the regions of Telugu country were brought under the sway of Sri Venkateswara or his modern avatars in different forms. In fact, Maharashtrians used to jeer at the Telugu folk converting Saibu (Muslim) as Saibaba in Shiridi, and his avatar as SatyaSai Baba is also a creative skill of our own people. It is said that the astute Malayalee found the popularity of our lord Venkateswara attracting more devotees and Anantpadmanabha becoming obsolete initiated Ayyappa to get more Telugu biddas around.
We have now branches in Delhi, Mumbai and places wherever our Telugus moved out. Thus, Telugu culture and pride are intimately twined with our spirituality or patronage of a particular branch of dominant Hindu faith. The Muslim and Christian minority communities are internally differentiated, but externally appear to be identical in the Telugu land. There have been different categories of heretics from the time of Ajvikas, Tantriks, Lokayatas, etc, who seemed to have lost their support base. The materialist worldview popularised by the Left is uniformly spread in the State. The spirituality thus obtained appears to be very constricted compared to the size of the Telugu speakers in the world. What is projected and explained here is only of the elite and the literate who have traditions of going to temple or places of worship at regular intervals. But a majority of non-traditional communities like the Adivasis who gather at Sammakka and Saralamma (mostly Telugu speakers) once in two or three years is equal to the total number of devotees attending (with all the comforts of travel, accommodation, etc) our national deity in a year.
Interestingly, there is a parallel system of spirituality among the ordinary people called as little tradition (mischievously by the missionaries with the support of local clerics) that is uniform and universal in all parts of Telugu country. They are the local or village deities. We have Gangamma in Rayalaseema, Pydithalli, Neelamani, Nookalu in Noeth Andhra, Pochamma, Yellamma, Mysamma in Telangana and Kanyakparameswari and KanakaDurga in Coastal Andhra. Remarkably, there seems to be no competition among the peoples’ goddesses and do not bother about huge and elaborate rituals and are happy with the local low-caste person officiating as a priest till it gets sufficient income to attract others.
This is unique to Telugu people and seems to be not found in our neighbouring States. We have been as a particular language speakers with uniform culture remained uninterrupted and enriched our common traditions of spirituality.
The exuberance of Telugu spirituality endured similar rituals and practices all over with marginal differences.
Interestingly, there are around 500 temples (mostly Vaishnava and no village deities) in the USA with Telugu-speaking Tamilians or Tamil-speaking Telugus conducting rituals. Thus, we have our Telugu pride carried far and wide through the notion of spiritual unity. Is Telugu spirituality not adequate to fix all the Telugu speakers under one shade of unity with administrative diversity?
Future of Water Deficit States?
The Telugu people are drawn in to an added anxiety in the form of Brijeshkumar Tribunal award on Krishna river water. This is not the first time nor would it ever resolve the problems of our state in future given the nature of the issue. The interstate agreements on Krishna started during the British in 1892 and repeated in 1933, 1944 and 1946 due to the geographical expanse of the river. Krishna and Godavari are the biggest rivers in Peninsular India having almost the same length of 1401 and 1465 Kms respectively. Krishna originates in Western Ghats, slinks 15 per cent of its length in Maharashtra, 23 per cent in Karnataka and rest 62 per cent in Andhra Pradesh. Keeping the interstate demands and controversies, the government of India has appointed the Krishna Water Tribunal in 1969 using the Interstate Water Disputes Act 1956. Interestingly, rivers come under central list (56) and the maintenance of irrigation and canals, water supplies etc under state list (17). Given the Federal structure in India is different from USA or Australia due to historical and structural reasons; centre entangles to redress disputes between states through the process of Tribunal Awards.
Water is a precious resource for sustenance of life. Once it was considered as free good is now reduced as the scarcest thing and therefore a commodity with all the economic characteristics. Out of the 2.7 per cent of fresh water on earth, 75 per cent is frozen in the polars and limited quantity is available on surface through run off. Though North India has the bounty of perennial Ganga, Brahmaputra, Indus etc originating in the Himalayas, South is not so blessed ( may be vastudosham ). Tamilnadu and Andhra Pradesh are considered as water deficit as they are on the receiving end of the river systems. The interstate disputes led the central Government to establish 5 river water tribunals. Interestingly, out of 5, two are for Andhra Pradesh. As we are preoccupied with the Coastal Andhra and Krishna and Godavari so intensely, we are not even aware of the fact that Vamsadhara Tribunal was not provided with an office space and expediently ignored North Andhra farmers.
The KWDT I and II consisting of Bachawat and Brizeshkumar verdicts are discussed in detail in different fora and facts are known to many. Award II has considered 65 per cent dependability and arrived at 2578 TMC for distribution with 16 TMC to flow down Prakasham barrage as environmental flow till 2050.We have chosen scheme A and seem to have not touched scheme B. We are definitely deprived of the legitimate share in the water given the principles or methods adopted to arrive at the formula of sharing. As 80 per cent of the rivers in India are interstate and we have committed a blunder in allowing Visakhapatnam district to be bifurcated in 1936 (as part of Odissa), we have very few sources of fresh water. Critics do also mention how we are indiscriminately used our water and in a short period of time swallowed 27 TMCs of fresh water in Kolleru Lake, the largest in South East Asia. However, Telugu people are proud of being the providers of food to the entire East in the form of rice and fish. We are also proud of our farmers who are progressive and scientific in their approach to adopt to modern techniques and methods of cultivation particularly in areas where irrigation water is assured.
The utilisation of water for agriculture can be assessed in terms of Net Irrigated area in Net Sown area. The data with the Ministry of Water Resources show that we have 40.73 per cent coverage while our neighbours Karnataka 25.4 per cent and Maharashtra 16.78. After 2001 Karnataka and Maharashtra have planned 16 and 56 major projects respectively. The highest irrigated states are Punjab and Haryana with 84 per cent, Bihar, UP, Bengal in the Gangetic plane 50-70 per cent. Among the South Indian states, Tamilnadu with 54 per cent stands first. Between the deficit states, Andhra farmers are the most productive and translated the Government of India Green Revolution in to a reality and are contributing to the national pool of food stock to accomplish the Right to Food security. Is this the way a state that comes to the rescue of the government being treated in the allocation of water? Why the guidelines that mention factors like drought, population, irrigation needs, drainage etc did not come to the rescue of Andhra Pradesh? What happened to the “Principle of Equal Apportionment”?
Interstate disputes on distribution of water is not unique to India, USA has similar problems. In this context, we may cite the Supreme Court of USA ruling that, ‘in exercise of an informed judgment, factors like, physical conditions, climate, the use of water, the character and rate of return flow, the extent of established uses, the availability of storage of water and the practical effects of wasteful use are considered’. It can also be based on: 1.states can divide water by the amount of flow each state contributes. For example, if A contributes 60 per cent of flow, it gets 60 per cent. But if it occupies 60 per cent area and contributes to 30 per cent, a compromise is needed. 2. Based on historical claims such as “prior assertion” of using say 60 per cent water.3. Dividing on the basis of priority uses like drinking, municipal, fisheries etc. Some Economists suggest that it is possible to standardise for every use to arrive at “water foot print” (value of) and leave it to the market to decide the flow. This is an extreme step seems to have been tried by World Bank experts with precarious results. This method is not useful in a country like ours where we have several discontents and disconnects making market redundant or fragmented. Andhra Pradesh a deficit state should argue that inadequacy is not a concern of Coastal Andhra; it is a national issue as it would adversely affect the national pool of food grains. There are already 125 bilateral agreements on water. The state Government can initiate a dialogue with Karnataka to get release of water on time from our share to meet farming operations and the same amount of water seized later in a staggered manner. We may also redesign our agricultural strategies including ground water use in delta, cropping pattern and other alternatives while fighting for our Right to Water. Andhra is blessed with 950Kms of coast to make use of reverse osmosis and other non-conventional sources to meet the challenges of deficit. Is it not reasonable to ask for compensation to reward the forgone share of our water?
Corporate cultivation a la cooperative farming
In the context of covert attempts to introduce corporate farming on a large scale, the author looks at whether the sizes of average and marginal holdings can benefit in the absence of appropriate technology and capitalIndia, being a Third World com pliant country for experiments of the advanced nations, is now targeted for innovations in the farm sector. There seems to be a proposal, maybe a policy decision, to introduce corporate farming in the country, if it is not already in force in a different garb.
It is not only in the agriculture sector; but all areas of the economy, society, including political process, society, including political process, are under the direct ideological manoeuvring of liberalisation. Therefore, one need not be surprised to get a regime of corporate farming in the country when the government is in crisis. It seems important administrative resolutions are taken in the country whenever the governments have been in disorder during the last two decades. If the past record of events is of any use for prediction, corporate farming seems to be certain.
There are farm and business lobbies with intellectual inputs from experts in the field to substantiate the need for corporate farming. Why not? It is demonstrated by scholars and management experts that small farms and fragmentation of holdings are a bane of Indian agriculture as they are unviable and economically disastrous.
This is supported by data that the marginal holdings of less than one hectare of land on an average have remained at 0.4 at the national level and in Andhra Pradesh at 0.44 ha. The proportion of such holdings in the total holdings in our State has slightly increased from 61.59 to 63.59 during 2005-2011.
Therefore, it is sensible to go in for corporatisation of farming in States like Andhra Pradesh where the proportion of marginal holdings is very high. There is also an argument that the marginal farmers have failed to bring in technology and innovations to improve the productivity of agricultural operations and, as a result, the farmer remains poor and underdeveloped.
What is the harm if the small bit of holdings is given to a corporate body that brings technology, investment and remunerative prices through access to international market?
The above argument seems to be not supported by productivity data. For instance, the productivity of rice was 3011 kgs per ha in 2003-4 and it increased to 3148 by 2011-12 in Andhra Pradesh. The productivity of jowar, an important crop in the State, was 1102 kgs in 2003-4 and it substantially rose to 1749 in 2011-12.
If the farmer is not getting remunerative prices, it is not due to the unviable nature of his holdings, but other economic and policy related constraints. In fact, around a century ago economists had reminded that it is not the size of the holdings but the amount of investment made on the piece of land that is to be taken into consideration in measuring productivity.
Arthur Lewis, later Ranis-Fei, Hayami and other economists have reasoned that the supply of food and labour to the sustenance of industry are important as they not only create demand for the industrial goods but also in getting foreign exchange through agricultural exports. Getting foreign exchange through agri India is not the USA or Japan to reduce the role of agriculture to less than 5 per cent of GDP as 60 persons of every hundred depend on it. The role of industry in creating jobs is not encouraging (NSS survey) to throw away the babe along with the bathwater.
Notwithstanding the arguments of some economists, the policymakers and economic managers have introduced sufficient policy packages to encourage corporatisation of cultivation in a phased manner. In fact, a variant of the commercialisation of variant of the commercialisation of agriculture was already in place in the form of contract farming.
This is a kind of vertical integration of farmers to supply a given quantity and quality of products at an agreed price to the buyer, mostly involving the corporates. There are 10 top corporate houses like Tata, Ambanis, Bharati, Agrigold (AP), IEEPL apart from MNCs that are in this business quite for some time. They are very powerful and are lobbying for corporatisation of farming and linking it with FDI and international cartels.
Now consider the experience of contract farming, a prelude to corporate farming. Harish Damodaran, in one of his reports in Business Line in June 2012, reported that the corporate ventures in agriculture are failing. He has given a case study of Tata Chemicals in the area of fresh fruits and vegetables in Malerkotla, Punjab, where it shut its operations for non-achieving the planned scale of operations. d We have in our State the Kuppam experiment.
Economies of scale are a prerequisite of corporatisation. Yet, experience on this front is not encouraging. Look at the ideology of cooperative farming whose ideological genesis rests with Robert Owen and the subsequent Cooperative Credit Society Act 1904 in India. The e ideal behind the movement was to develop the spirit of n mutual help and social harmony, equity and empowerment.
Though it was confined to credit and expansion of r sugar, milk and a few other areas in the agriculture sector, t it has provided the necessary impetus for the development n of innovations under the guidance of the State.
It is reported that there are 5.5 lakh cooperatives (PACs, etc) with a membership of 22 croresextent of covert. We may attribute the limited success We may attribute the limited success of the so-called First Green Revolution to the spirit of public interest imbibed by the cooperative spirit.
Interestingly, the central government has brought the 97th constitutional amendment and added 43B to promote voluntary formation, autonomous functioning and democratic control of cooperatives. It has also enacted the Multistate Cooperatives Act in 2002 to facilitate interstate operations of agricultural cooperatives. The XII Plan envisages tenancy reforms to enable leasing out of land to “others“. We have yet to see the impact of the initiatives of the State on the economic efficiency and social uplift of the farmers. Billions of rupees were invested in the development of infra-structure, including public irrigation, technology, KVS, etc, and billions are earmarked as subsidies. Then why the sudden shift in the policy towards privatisation and corporatisation of the farm sector?
If the private sector and FIIs are considered by some experts as efficient, the government should make a law that they should restrict their operations in areas uncovered by cooperatives and low technology zones.
Let them bring capital and technology without encroaching on the public resources and improve the welfare of farmers without repeating what they have done in Brazil, Ethiopia, Sudan, Tanzania and other Third World countries.
Our Legislators did a great job!
The Andhra Pradesh legislators of Seemnadhra and Telangana regions did a great job in fulfilling their legislative responsibilities and have completed the process on the Bill-2013 at the state level. It is now left to the Parliamentarians of the country to take it to a logical end or reject or hang onto the vexed issue. However, it is time to reflect without prejudice to any one as to how our Telugu legislators acted in the course of the whole drama of brining a lot of issues for public debate. I don’t think any other state in the recent past has spent so much of energy, time and intellect in debating on a single issue. Someone might say that there was no turmoil in the formation of certain states and there was unanimity in making legislation, however does not augur well for democracy. Democracy in the modern world is a process of continuing debate and discussion to arrive at consensus without limitations of a party or group directive. We are not interested here about the outcome of that debate, but only the process.
Democratic deliberations at the present are ultimately used to arrive at decisions that are broadly benefiting the participants and not necessarily the people that they represent. We cannot compare the kind of democracy that existed during the Buddhist period or during Abraham Lincoln, Karl Popper, etc., when the role of media in public life was limited. Scholars have now devised terms like “mediacracy“, “mediatisation” where political institutions rely heavily on media. It is a post-modernist trend in political communication to influence a discourse. The process of dispassionate discussion and the free and indiscriminate access to media sources as a part of democratic values in the current state of affairs is dichotomous; given the jingoisms. Telugus are not far behind this trend. This appears to be a serious issue that needs a separate debate.
We must keep in mind that the rhetoric or serious deliberations of our Legislators in both the houses of Assembly and Council and in public platforms may be reckoned to commend our leaders. The topics and the scale of issues within each subject are found to be very huge but limited to Andhra Pradesh and to Telugu people. It is heartening to note that some of them have claimed academic and research credentials (irrespective of their subject specialisation) in presenting material for public debate. I think no university or the community of academic scholars in the state had prepared as much material as the legislators did to our united and complex Telugu culture. Unfortunately no one seems to have clarified whether there was any single state or domain ever existed in the name of ‘Andhra’ or ‘Telugu’ within the confines of the present territory (on which the debates are organised) or were allusions or myths attributed to language speakers by pundits, scholars and by sporadic writings. What was the objective of the writers in depicting our past history, culture and geographical unity? Did India imagined or created or formed with a place for Telugu country or nations like Satavahanas, Vishnukundins, Kakatiyas, Kalingas, etc? Who were the original Telugu speakers? The number of issues brought in for debate are so vast that may inspire scholars and writers for serious study and reflection to generate credible material (apart from APHS) that would be the common property of all Telugus in future.
It is in this context, we may discuss how our leaders have suggested modifications and amendments to the Bifurcation Bill. It is found that the so-called controversial Bill-2013 is of 63 pages with 108 Articles, 13 schedules. It seems the Bill is modelled on the lines of ‘The Andhra State Act 1953’ that had 58 Articles and 9 schedules. The more comprehensive ‘The States Reorganisation Act 1956’ based on which the present Andhra Pradesh and several other states were formed,had 136 Articles and no schedules. We must applaud our bureaucrats for their expertise in the art of making excellent Bills and Cabinet Notes. It seems only senior bureaucrats in the rank of Joint Secretary (state level secretary) and above is involved in the drafting of the Bill and it is unlikely that they would have deliberately committed mistakes and invite disciplinary action. Political executive are different.
It is fascinating to note that the present Bill was discussed threadbare, otherwise how could anyone expect around 9000 amendments. It means that each article on an average has 142 amendments and each line about 4 modifications. This is really fantastic and needs to be verified, is it a record? We should congratulate our legislators for the unique feat. It is curious to observe that advocates, retired judges and experts in constitutional matters were dragged into the debate perhaps to give legitimacy to some of their opinions. We may reflect here on several interesting expositions about how the legal profession was borrowed from colonial masters and not based on our ethos. Most of the freedom fighters and later legislators were drawn from the emerging professions like lawyers, doctors, etc. They represented us in the Constituent Assembly that created our Constitution. Therefore, the anecdote goes they have clarity and purpose in making all the Articles relating to Judiciary impermeable and resulted in only one amendment out of 98 so far. Even that amendment is related to the salaries of Judges in 1986. But, there are amendments and revisions on other concerns including an attempt to redraft the Constitution.
As long as the Judiciary is drawn from the open Legal Profession, without a permanent cadre of judicial officers, live contact among the fraternity remains and reflects the dichotomies and wide differences in their interpretations. Is it justified in a democratic polity? However, a Judge, according to Prof Moolchand Sharma (a scholar of legal studies and personal friend, VC-CUH) should have ‘compounded faculties of a historian, philosopher and a prophet’. Some of the qualities are also anticipated in Lawyers. We know the dearth of such abilities among our office seekers today (many lament), and therefore, most of the issues including the bifurcation problem are technically interpreted.
In a Parliamentary democracy, Parliament is said to be supreme and the wisdom of the Members of both the houses would ultimately prevail. But, the question remains what message or image our Telugu legislators have given to the country? How does the present tangle help the common man without any vision or perspective plan? Does UT status help all? Did the legislators ever cared discussing problems of common people and why is this unexpected love for the land? Did the amendments (confidential) really reflect the wish and will of the people or only the interest groups?
Yes, Caste does matter!
As the 2014 elections are fast approaching, issues that attract the attention of the voters are being stirred up. Last week JanardanDwivedi provoked the reservation communities through an avowal to end caste-based reservations. Khap caste Panchayats were supported by Hooda while Modis entreating for OBC tag. Harish Rao of TRS has alleged caste angle against Jaya PrakashNarayana of LokSatta voting TDP candidate. The gossip of two or three ruling castes getting united on packages irrespective of parties has compelled ruckus in Parliament, needs scrutiny. BSP-SP and several caste outfits are active now. The BCCI president Srinivasan is found in an obscure position with Mudgal report confirming his son-in-law Meiyappan in betting. This relationship is stronger than social bond of caste with international implications. The discrimination and killing of North-East Indians in Delhi are being compared with Dalits of mainland. The above cases can be taken up for a dispassionate academic discussion whether caste matters in public life.
Caste has been practiced by everyone in the subcontinent consciously or instinctively as a habit but, repudiated invariably in public. There seems to be little appreciation about the economic potential of caste, though hundreds of studies by western and Indian scholars are available. In fact, very few knew about the ecology of caste and its changing contours in different parts of India. Perhaps, everyone has a stake in the varna (caste currently), a phenomenon of reservation of caste based occupations. Interestingly, Andhras have inadequate knowledge about the castes in Odissa or Kerala and Punjabis do not know what kind of castes exist in Bengal, Maharashtrians generalise their experience as universal without understanding its ubiquitous and diverse nature, and so on. The Western social anthropologists like Kathleen Gough and the Indian scholar MadhavGadgil have tried to project some castes as ecology dependent, but did not elaborate the geography of castes. It was only in the modern period Rajni Kothari and others have studied the political potential of caste. But, we have very few reflections why the British skilfully adopted divide and rule here with advantage and not in other common wealth countries. Hence, we can say caste is a nasty thing not only in social relations but even to consider it for academic debate. Nevertheless, our leaders have been expressing opinions occasionally for political purpose and not necessarily to annihilate it; except Lohia and Ambedkar.
Now, look at the practice of caste-related biases in our democratic institutions, like political parties, media, social gathering, etc, to comprehend how far they are free from prejudices. For instance, who in Dwivedi’s party devise policies and influence political manoeuvrings and their share in the population? Is it evenly distributed? The same is true for other parties including some caste-based and progressive ones who started giving reservations in the party after Mandal to counter public criticism, but not essentially for decision making. Major share of the Corporate Media is held by few castes while the opinions are voiced by select few traditional castes. Though media delude all of us with the idea of freedom of speech, does it really representative of the castes in reporting or projecting issues or individuals in proportion to their legitimate share? We know how little known individuals are pampered due to their social background bereft of attainments. Is there any content analysis as to how the channels in our state represented the recent bifurcation issue? Will the dispassionate channels be allowed to survive? Is public space which should democratically be accessible to all is ever representative of our diverse caste groups? The answer is obvious.
Though many people abhor caste-based discrimination, the issue is how to eradicate it when economic opportunities are seized by few organised castes as against the multitude? Don’t we know the economic background of some of the billionaires of our state or others about five decades back and how they became super rich now? Is it not due to caste mobilisation or the so-called crony capitalism suited to our conditions? People talk about reservations in jobs of let us say (15%) scheduled castes. There are 175 lakh jobs in government (state, union, local body, public sector) where the castebased reservations are observed. It means that there will be 26 lakh dalits in all categories of public employment. It is around one per cent (1.3) of the 20 croredalits in India. They do only represent the disadvantaged and may not as Dwivedi remarked, allow the poor among them to occupy the positions. This is what we call a `phenomenon of circulation of families’. This is much worse in the case of Adivasis and the OBCs who have just begun. This is also true even among the dwija and sudra castes. It is a systemic paradox.
There are bizarrely unconventional groups who got in to power and became propertied class by seizure. How could they do it? Is it not through caste mobilisation? While the few who do not have any reservations used their caste for capturing opportunities in different names, the reservation castes do complain that they remained insecure in a market economy. Some of them might argue that it would provide prospects to grow as capitalists. But, the total asset value of all the dalits for instance, including the few neocorporates among them is not equal to one day share value transaction of some Business Houses. How long does it take to convert at least 15 croredalits (out of 20) and 5 croreAdivasis (out of 7 crore) as crorepathis? The question is how to resolve this riddle? Are caste-based reservations a solution to ameliorate their conditions? No.
Caste is used in India now as a socio-economic identity to target groups with some aid. Are the political parties and society prepared to face the groups if they are released from this forced incubation? More than anyone, the politicians recognise the traditional patron-client relations transforming as development messiah and aid recipient. The former is a person in power and the latter has always remained as a reservation category creature. Thus, each politician developed his own constituency, particularly among the poor on the basis of poverty alleviation schemes, castebased reservations etc.
This must have been the longstanding convention in India. Therefore, no one is prepared to sacrifice this privilege of holding power through caste. This appears to be the fact behind the bifurcation politics in Andhra Pradesh that forged alleged unity among different political groups with same caste heads getting united to hoodwink common man? Is it the same concord that submerged sub-caste differences once the issue of abolition of reservations is initiated? That is the power of caste in India known to the ruling castes better than other groups. Yes, caste does matter today in politics and public policy.
Reassign Grabbed lands to Original Dalit and Adivasi Assignees
In Telangana
The Telangana agitation and the bifurcation issue in Andhra Pradesh positioned around Hyderabad city. The central government and policy makers who are not aware of the history of Hyderabad city wonder why Seemandhra politicians including the CM, Ex-CM and several others are particular about the city. It appears to be due to the real estate value of freehold lands .The city and the Ex-Hyderabad state or Nizam never had a systematic survey of lands. It was eitherRyotwari in some parts and Zagirdari in many parts of the state that made the records of lands precarious. The city was under the control of Nizam and his relatives. Some of them left the country after the police action in 1948 and many after 1956. Therefore, the lands that were held by them have become evacuee property or enemy property as per Government of India Acts. However, the state government has made use of the temporary records created by corrupt revenue officials with the connivance of politicians in transferring the lands to their cronies around the year 1980 and that continued thereafter in the name of protecting the lands of the poor that helped ultimately the mafia. Everyone knows that the Banjara and jubilee Hills were under the occupation of banjaras and other adivasi groups. The lands in the surrounding area of Hyderabad metropolitan region belonged to the original TelanganaAdivasis, Dalits and other poor backward castes who could not develop them due to lack of investment and state support. Thus, Hyderabad city lands became attractive real estate without much investment and by way of the cunning support of the government infrastructure projectsalleged to be developed to bring value to the lands transferred to cronies/benamis like Jayabheri, Emaar etc. Naturally all of them irrespective of the political party are interested in protecting their landed property. There are some corrupt civil servants and their relatives and realtors are also involved in this. It is under this background we are interested in protecting the lands of the poor of the city in general and dalits in particular.
The dalit community in Telangana was the backbone of agriculture sector as they are the hardworking labourers ever available to toil and in that process owned pieces of land. Some of the families belonging to dalits have developed as contractors in Hyderabad and some as land lords in rural areas. Some dalits got pieces of land when land was redistributed by the communists and many inherited lands as property. Therefore, when the Jamindari abolition took place in the combined state, dalits in Telangana had already some land in their possession and some landless poor dalits got assigned lands.
The government of Andhra Pradesh started the land assignment policy from the year 1958. It was under GO MS NO 1407 dated 25-7-1958 for Andhra region and for Telangana it was through GO MS No 1406 dated 25-7-1958. Land was under the control of Board of Revenue in the British India regime for Madras Presidency where part of Andhra was integrated. Therefore, a separate Board of Revenue was created for the combined state in 1956 to deal with land issues. In other words, land issues in the two different regions were not uniform and the tribal regions in Telangana and the systems adopted by Nizam for tribal areas and the Constitutional provisions for Fifth schedule areas have not been properly amalgamated in the state when the 1969 agitation for separate Telangana took place. The settlers from Coastal Andhra became naturalized and started owning lands in Telangana. Some of them have seized lands even in tribal areas (using 2/1970 clause of 8 years stay) due to absence of systematic survey during the Nizam. By the time Hyderabad state adopted the Bombay methods of survey, the state merged with Andhra. In the Hyderabad state, the Revenue officials were bribed and vast stretches of land got registered in the names of settlers and local doras, patels, etc got them included in the Revenue records ( Tippan, Sethwar books etc). Dalits have also acquired some land through their hard work and also some as landless labourers got land from the land reforms of government. Thus, the dalits of Telangana region had owned land by the time the region joined Andhra Pradesh in 1956. They were further supported by the assignment policy of the government and the Jagirdari and Zamindari abolitions that prescribed distribution of surplus land to the land less with emphasis on SC, ST and OBC groups.
Lands of Dalits and Adivasis are grabbed
As per official statistics, dalits had 9,88473 acres from assignments of government of Andhra Pradesh and from other sources another 726847 acres are added, making the total lands held by dalits as 17, 15316 acres in the state. Out of which 96,123 acres are held without title. It is reported that the landless among SCs in Telangana are very few compared to West Godavari, Krishna, Guntur and other developed coastal districts. Interestingly the land less dalits in Telangana particularly in Medak (15%) RangaReddy (19%), Mahabubnagar (29%) and Nalgonda(36%) are the lowest in the combined state. It means dalits in Telangana and in Greater Hyderabad region are found to own some lands. Out of a total 7, 66466 acres owned by dalits in Telangana, around 70 percent of the lands, as per some records are patta lands.
It is noted that the lands in Hyderabad city agglomeration are not systematically surveyed and recorded. Yet, the lands owned by dalits are either patta lands or assigned by the government under D- Form and through other titles. Most of the lands in Rangareddy, Medak and Hyderabad city limits belong to Sarf-e-khas or crown lands or lands belonging to the Wakf Board or those who left the country without proper transfer of titles. Dalits in the region held some of these lands and have been cultivating them for their livelihood. They are evicted by the powerful land grabbers and mafia as the dalits are un-organized and do not have any strong voice. Now the issue is how they lost the lands in their possession? The lands legitimately held with titles that were either assigned to them or inherited are transferred to others in the name of acquisition for public purpose. It is estimated that the four districts, Mahbubnagar, Medak, Rangareddy and Nalgonda in the vicinity of Greater Hyderabad had 4,13576 acres owned by dalits. Out of this amount, it is found that 166948 acres are assigned lands allotted in the name of the dalits. We do not know how many of these lands are now under their control and possession and how much is grabbed by others. We do not have any official data except our experience and the episodes narrated by our dalit victims telling us about frauds perpetuated on our ignorant and illiterate dalits.
The major problem with the ownership of lands of dalits is that they are not allowed to own and cultivate due to their vulnerability and poverty particularly after 1960s. It is a known fact that most of the lands are either assigned or surplus lands distributed by the government are under the control of a dominant person/ persons either in the village or in urban areas. The land records in Telangana are very archaic creating problems both to the Judiciary and to the Executive. Therefore, we are not sure how the lands that are shown in the name of the dalits as per records of the government or SERP (Rural Development Ministry) etc are physically held by the dalits. It seems, the SERP is running some programmes like Indira Krantipatham for dalit and weaker section land holders and know what proportion of the lands are transferred to others in the name of mutations and other means. It is also true that the Government in connivance with the land mafia acquired lands from the dalits and in some cases paid some compensation. They are in turn transferred to the real estate business seemingly in legitimate manner. But, this is all to hoodwink the poor dalits of Telangana to get the benefit of escalation of land rates. They are grabbed from them for making fortunes without any share in it for dalits. The involvement of some IAS officers in the dealings and the CBI cases are a points to be considered in this direction. In most of the cases, the quid pro quo was in operation and the legitimate dalit owners of lands did not get any benefit. This has happened against the provisions of A.P Assigned Lands (Prohibition and Transfer) Act 19777.
The Government of Andhra Pradesh has issued GO MS 633 (Revenue) (q) dated 5-5-1982 placing strong instructions not to transfer or dispose vacant lands within 10 KMs of Hyderabad city. But the instructions were withdrawn under GO MS 1122 and particularly through a memo issued by the Chief Commissioner of Land Administration in January 2007. There was uproar in the Assembly against such twisting of regulations and rules that are against the interests of poor dalits and adivasis who owned precious lands in the Hyderabad region. There are several such modifications to the existing rules including Scheduled area regulations relaxing the clause that if a non-tribal lived in tribal areas for 8 years, he/she could be given rights in the agency etc (2/1970). They are all manipulations done by the powerful people who are within the government or with the support of government officials are holding sway over the lands of poor Dalits and Adivasis in Telangana. We know the kind of land transfers and the political fallout of the same in the bifurcation. For instance, even NGOS and those who possessed lands by illegal means mostly from dalits do not want any judicial review of the dealings. This itself show the intents of the leaders.
Therefore, we demand justice to the dalits who are rightful owners of around 2 lakh acres of lands in the Greater Hyderabad region consisting of four districts. We demand the Government of India and the GOM on Telangana,to address our immediate problems. As the present Chief Minister and the Seemandhra politicians cum real estate owners are alleged to be involved in this illegal transfer and grabbing of lands of the dalits, we appeal to the government and democratic organizations to intervene and do justice before the formation of the state or include a clause relating to the Dalits lands in the state formation Bill.
Demands of the victims
1. Reassign the lands to dalits in the Hyderabad region in particular and in Telangana in general by invoking existing Acts and rules prohibiting sale or transfer of assigned and patta lands of dalits by dubious means. The government should implore PCR Act provisions for recovering the lands.
2. Appoint a Judicial committee with a sitting Supreme Court Judge to enquire in to the illegal and forceful confiscation of lands from Dalits and Adivasis and others in Hyderabad city region.
3. Nationalize all lands in the Greater Hyderabad region to arrest speculation and to get revenue for the state since all the lands in the region are crown lands and belong to the Government.
4. Initiate legal and disciplinary action against leaders, officers and persons who were involved in the process of transfer of lands of the dalits and punish the culprits severely as per rules. They should not be protected under the garb of policy decisions as they are all irrational decisions and against the provisions of Acts made to protect dalits and their property and honour in India
(Extracted from a memorandum prepared by the Telangana Dalit’s land Protection Committee, TDLPC)
Appendix Tables
Table 1: A Profile of Telangana
| Item | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 |
| Area | Pop | Den | Urb | Sex.R | IMR | Lit. | SC/ ST | Wor | PAgr. | Out-put | Sdp | |
| Andhra Pradesh | 275 | 76.2 | 277 | 27.3 | 978 | 43 | 60.5 | 22.8 | 45.8 | 62.2 | 24.6 | 35600 |
| Telangana inc. Hyd. | 114.8 | 30.9 | 270 | 31.8 | 971 | 40 | 58.0 | 24.7 | 45.4 | 58.3 | 20.2 | 36082 |
| Telangana exc.Hyd | 114.6 | 27.1 | 237 | 22.2 | 977 | 42 | 55.0 | 27.0 | 47.7 | 63.2 | 20.2 | 33771 |
| Adilabad | 16.1 | 2.5 | 155 | 26.5 | 989 | 44 | 52.7 | 35.3 | 45.1 | 61.0 | 12.7 | 29187 |
| Nizamabad | 8.0 | 2.3 | 293 | 18.1 | 1017 | 40 | 52.0 | 21.9 | 49.4 | 57.0 | 29.0 | 26241 |
| Karimnagar | 11.8 | 3.5 | 296 | 19.4 | 998 | 29 | 54.9 | 21.2 | 49.0 | 58.7 | 26.8 | 33844 |
| Medak | 9.7 | 2.7 | 275 | 14.4 | 974 | 40 | 51.6 | 22.6 | 48.4 | 67.7 | 19.5 | 42052 |
| Mahabub nagar | 18.4 | 3.5 | 191 | 10.6 | 972 | 58 | 44.4 | 25.0 | 51.9 | 73.2 | 11.0 | 27959 |
| Khammam | 16.0 | 2.6 | 161 | 19.8 | 975 | 40 | 56.9 | 43.0 | 48.3 | 72.1 | 27.2 | 37194 |
| Warangal | 12.9 | 3.2 | 252 | 19.2 | 973 | 41 | 57.1 | 31.1 | 48.3 | 68.1 | 25.3 | 26306 |
| Nalgonda | 14.2 | 3.2 | 229 | 13.3 | 966 | 48 | 57.2 | 28.3 | 49.1 | 67.6 | 14.6 | 34138 |
| Rangareddi | 7.5 | 3.6 | 477 | 54.2 | 944 | 38 | 66.2 | 18.6 | 40.2 | 40.5 | 14.6 | 43400 |
| Hyderabad | 0.2 | 3.8 | 19149 | 100 | 933 | 22 | 78.8 | 8.9 | 29.2 | 1.7 | — | 51856 |
Source: Justice B.N. SriKrishna Committee Report, 2008,
Notes: 1 Area 000sq kms 2.population mln 3.density of population per sqkm 4. Urbanisation % 5.sex ratio 6.IMR per 1000 7.Literacy rate 8.SC/ST% 9.Work participation rate 10.Agr workrs% 11.Ag outpt 12.Per cap DDP
Table-2
District Per capita Income at factor cost in current prices
| Sl. No. | District | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | 2006-07 | 2007-08 | 2008-09 | 2009-10(TRE) | 2010-11(SRE) |
| 1 | Adilabad | 22294 | 24013 | 27740 | 32577 | 40351 | 42491 | 53152 |
| 2. | Nizamabad | 17742 | 21539 | 23457 | 28251 | 39755 | 36714 | 50742 |
| 3. | Karimnagar | 22249 | 27544 | 30570 | 35394 | 43503 | 44808 | 58002 |
| 4. | Medak | 27533 | 32351 | 41226 | 43667 | 54935 | 58986 | 76014 |
| 5. | Hyderabad | 36560 | 43411 | 52325 | 62020 | 73775 | 81741 | 99706 |
| 6. | Rangareddy | 29166 | 36776 | 42976 | 49931 | 63328 | 66867 | 84693 |
| 7. | Mahabubnagar | 17507 | 21845 | 23206 | 29007 | 33734 | 39338 | 47490 |
| 8. | Nalgonda | 20274 | 23753 | 26945 | 37200 | 46895 | 46899 | 53699 |
| 9. | Warangal | 19665 | 22495 | 24239 | 28959 | 35452 | 36843 | 47947 |
| 10. | Khammam | 27258 | 29745 | 33083 | 39142 | 48555 | 51333 | 61200 |
Source: Government of A .P, Economic Survey 2012-13 (for rest of the tables also)
Table-3
Gross Value Added of Industry Sector at Current Prices (Rs. Lakh)
| Sl. No. | District | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | 2006-07 | 2007-08 | 2008-09 | 2009-10(TRE) | 2010-11(SRE) |
| 1 | Adilabad | 203968 | 191502 | 232983 | 286195 | 381982 | 447453 | 501193 |
| 2. | Nizamabad | 119875 | 138489 | 161081 | 193253 | 352488 | 255061 | 308364 |
| 3. | Karimnagar | 330364 | 353494 | 431526 | 473521 | 562525 | 645920 | 751298 |
| 4. | Medak | 329286 | 396484 | 600681 | 535457 | 779125 | 916660 | 1044978 |
| 5. | Hyderabad | 286423 | 409032 | 501164 | 608529 | 633329 | 654238 | 827147 |
| 6. | Rangareddy | 477686 | 651088 | 862390 | 958993 | 133217 | 1353601 | 1680269 |
| 7. | Mahabubnagar | 196955 | 232007 | 236048 | 282430 | 370020 | 427617 | 513265 |
| 8. | Nalgonda | 210354 | 235656 | 296719 | 486382 | 551003 | 558351 | 661841 |
| 9. | Warangal | 153134 | 185846 | 205898 | 271570 | 307035 | 342297 | 407305 |
| 10. | Khammam | 224264 | 266547 | 293650 | 363590 | 451227 | 535498 | 611043 |
Table-4
Gross value added in Services at current prices (Rs. in Lkahs)
| Sl. No. | District | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | 2006-07 | 2007-08 | 2008-09 | 2009-10(TRE) | 2010-11(SRE) |
| 1 | Adilabad | 305699 | 326703 | 391587 | 448849 | 544143 | 644579 | 740622 |
| 2. | Nizamabad | 258127 | 293349 | 335022 | 395847 | 493806 | 517204 | 656268 |
| 3. | Karimnagar | 431799 | 483951 | 553085 | 634957 | 779971 | 890343 | 1087316 |
| 4. | Medak | 370923 | 425460 | 535171 | 595312 | 732106 | 767826 | 1008948 |
| 5. | Hyderabad | 1357535 | 1629514 | 1985486 | 2378437 | 290544 | 3282299 | 4034826 |
| 6. | Rangareddy | 681218 | 886502 | 1041535 | 1289952 | 1593057 | 1767324 | 2263239 |
| 7. | Mahabubnagar | 353921 | 409906 | 457672 | 530534 | 612624 | 719156 | 860884 |
| 8. | Nalgonda | 345047 | 384975 | 436056 | 553165 | 747031 | 774609 | 868640 |
| 9. | Warangal | 380150 | 423355 | 476847 | 560376 | 646268 | 749135 | 903498 |
| 10. | Khammam | 355687 | 396103 | 457711 | 521214 | 646677 | 734510 | 858949 |
Tble-5
Gross Value Added in Agriculture at current prices (Rs in Lakhs)
| Sl. No. | District | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | 2006-07 | 2007-08 | 2008-09 | 2009-10(TRE) | 2010-11(SRE) |
| 1 | Adilabad | 143074 | 187655 | 205487 | 250971 | 308169 | 237102 | 420710 |
| 2. | Nizamabad | 108914 | 162189 | 159670 | 208565 | 296549 | 278466 | 488784 |
| 3. | Karimnagar | 146883 | 294664 | 293635 | 380572 | 482847 | 386176 | 656999 |
| 4. | Medak | 190448 | 239396 | 252124 | 340850 | 362031 | 389897 | 604603 |
| 5. | Hyderabad | 49321 | 13845 | 15036 | 16873 | 14904 | 19868 | 24760 |
| 6. | Rangareddy | 172143 | 200173 | 198395 | 242735 | 259449 | 285961 | 399010 |
| 7. | Mahabubnagar | 159826 | 246131 | 256464 | 375013 | 417971 | 512576 | 646339 |
| 8. | Nalgonda | 219454 | 284081 | 309576 | 434104 | 536596 | 530470 | 626371 |
| 9. | Warangal | 201667 | 243855 | 246245 | 291371 | 417210 | 352703 | 577553 |
| 10. | Khammam | 219486 | 241531 | 268125 | 335583 | 420424 | 373934 | 494212 |
