Slipstream People

I grew up in Hyderabad, and I am a proud Andhra. I went to a convent school, and later graduated from Osmania University with its spectacular Arts College building. Those days we never asked where our friends came from or what their religion was. Hyderabad was a cosmopolitan city and we were as likely to have friends who were Muslims or Parsis as Hindus. And among them would be some who spoke Urdu with as much elan as they did Telugu. The air was still heavy from the Naxal movement when we were in university, so the only thing we ever asked anyone was if they had been to jail.

My own family came here from Madras. My father, along with a few colleagues, had migrated from the Madras Preside­ncy to establish a new zonal office of the State Bank of India in Hyderabad. In his case, of course, the bankers were given an option of either choosing to stay in Madras or go to the newly formed zonal office in Andhra. It transpires that Tel­ugu-speaking people felt a tad discriminated against in the then Madras Presidency, so much so they tho­ught it was better they have their own state. The resultant Potti Sriramulu fast is the stuff of legend now, leading to the reorganisation of states soon after on a linguistic basis. When it was decided that the Telugu-speaking people of the Madras Presidency should have their own state, it was decided that Kurnool was to be the headquarters with T. Prakasam the first chief minister presiding over the state legislature set up there. Interestingly, the high court was set up in Guntur. In the meanwhile, the Telugu-speaking people who were part of the erstwhile Nizam's dominions asked that they too be allowed to join the newly formed state. I emphasise, it was the members of the legislative assembly in Hyderabad state who mooted the proposal for integration of the Tel­ugu people after which the state was formed on November 1, 1956, with Hyderabad as its capital and seat of power.

Obviously, after the state was formed, Andhras from all over chose to migrate to Hyderabad over Guntur or Kurnool as all the jobs, government or otherwise, were in the city. The identities of Telugus from both regions were forged as one, and no one cared to ask who the indigenous people were, or who the land belonged to.

These days there are accusations that the Andhras, when they moved to Hyderabad, took away the jobs that right­fully belonged to the people of Telangana. I would like to remind readers of Article 371D which gave special privileges to people from the region than to Andhras who came from outside. Why the Andhras were able to corner the administrative jobs or set up enterprises in Hyderabad was not because of any genetic superiority (as some of us would like to believe), but rather because of exposure to modern education and economy that came with being part of the Madras Presidency. Historically, because the Madras Presidency was under British rule, the people there had better life chances: access to education and its socio-economic corollaries. This was not the case in the Hyderabad state where, despite its fabled tales of wealth and riches, it was only the nawabs and the zamindars who had opportunities for advancement. Ordinary people in Nalgaonda or Warangal remained depr­i­ved and backward, living under the thumb of a dora or zamindar with no right even over their own land. The backwardness of the Telugus in Telangana is historical, and really not the fault of the Andhras.

But over the decades, irrespective of where our ancestors came from, we were all proud Hyderabadis, and worked towards making the making the city truly international. I remember one time in Andam­ans when someone I met at the Port Blair airport commented, “Oh, you are from Hyderabad which we hear is one of the finest states in the country.” Indeed it was, and I had beamed with pride remembering how clean our roads were, how eff­i­ciently the traffic moved, and how it was the hub of IT, att­racting the best companies from Silicon Valley to invest here.

Alas, all this is in the past. Now there is only chaos with our leaders more interested in rushing to Delhi than curbing the lawlessness pervading the state. These days people call us only to ask if we are safe in the state. Every time, there is a crowd outside on the streets, my elderly mother wakes up wondering when the exodus will begin and when Andhra families like ours to whom Hyderabad is home will be asked to move to another city, Vijayawada or even Kurnool. She doesn’t want to leave her home, leave alone the city. The union of Andhras with Telangana has been a marriage of 57 years. Having invested our lives and property here, how can we not but feel sad at the imminent divorce?

(The author is editor, House Calls)