As the world watches in disbelief _ the princely purge in Saudi Arabia _ the cradle of Islamist radicalism, that suddenly seems to be pacing to shake off the shackles of its purist Salafism, our very own K.Chandrashekar Rao, the CM of the 29th state Telangana, is all set to redeem his new state into a mini Saudi Arabia!
While the state grapples with its newly ascended statehood, its player is no novice at the game! After more than a decade at being a whining coalition partner, the materialization of Telangana seems to have emboldened further the separatist dream that is now being unleashed so unabashedly in KCR’s Telangana.
The polymath of polarization polity that he is, fondly known as KCR, he had famously ordered an ethnic profiling like survey in Telangana to ascertain the nativity of its citizens.
The survey was originally conceptualized to enlist people, to identify their nativity so as to prioritize extending the state benefits and schemes to Telangana natives that hinted at an economic exodus of Seemandra folks. After much furore on the discriminatory and separatist survey, some of the queries in the form were quashed in order to ease the public apprehension that had gone haywire with widespread media coverage that was well leveraged by the TDP. The bizarre survey ensured that the state was shut down for 2 days in order to facilitate every single person’s participation. A kind of order that is unlikely even during a Lok Sabha election!
The state not only expended crores of public money on this survey but also led to a 2 day economic loss in the markets however after much ado about the usefulness of the survey there was no proof of data as to how the outcome of this survey had aided the Government in anyway.
The stench of caste and subcaste equations is not new in Indian politics but if one has to understand the complexity of caste politics in the Telugu land, the brutality of the oppressive rule of the Nizam through his Reddy and Velama landlords cannot be ignored even in today’s context. KCR belongs to the Velama caste that was loyal to the Asif Jahi dynasty(Nizams) who were incidental in establishing the first Nizam’s rule(Bahamani Sultans). It was a quid pro quo arrangement between the Nizam and the Hindu landlords back then who in their greed for power and money had forfeited the cause of their weaker Hindu brethren. The princely state of Hyderabad was ruled by the oppressive Hindu landlords through the Nizam and a similar pattern is evident even today.
KCR is being referred to as the new Nizam of Hyderabad because of his unabashed Muslim appeasement.
In his 3 years stint as CM he has already showered several sops on the Muslim community. He has sought an exclusive Industrial estate and a separate IT corridor for Muslims(it is not to be forgotten that he was the disapproving scourge against the IT lobby while in TDP that led to Naidu’s ouster), he has been offering a 100% subsidy for self-employed Muslim minority, he has also announced funds for renovating and repairing Muslim areas(old city).
A revolutionary CM that he is who has promised to build Hyderabad Islamic Cultural Convention Centre spread over 10 acres, has in the past remarked that Telangana was under the golden rule of the Nizam but now reduced to penury under the Indian rule! While his daughter thinks that Kashmir and Telangana are separate entities, as the new CM he expressed that the Nizam of Hyderabad who wanted to join Pakistan even after the partition, is a praiseworthy icon of development! The list of KCR’s eccentric and unabashed Muslim allegiance promulgating into Telangana would put Jinnah to shame but for the casual indifference or ignorance of the masses that are too steeped in the ascension of their respective caste leaders yet again.
But what explains this blatant Muslim bonhomie?
Even after partition, Hyderabad which was under the Nizam was unwilling to integrate with India. The unofficial Islamic militia of Razzakars that was equivalent to today’s ISIS dominated the political and administrative discourse under the Nizam’s nourishment. The unofficial army of Razzakars was around 300000 men while the actual army consisted of only 22000 men. The then population of the state of Hyderabad which included parts of Maharastra, Andra Pradesh and Karnataka consisted of 85% Hindus but was dominated and controlled by the 12% of Muslims where all ruling posts were occupied by only Muslims.
This speaks volumes about the kind of fanaticism and ruthlessness of religious hegemony that was invested to steer power amidst a Hindu majority. Sadly it also reflects the disintegration, division, tolerance or the disoriented defenselessness of the Hindus who had got used to a secular servitude with 250 years of the Nizam’s rule.
Even after Independence the Nizam of Hyderabad had sought the UN’s aid in remaining an independent constitutional monarchy in its quest to join Pakistan sooner or later. Even after signing the Standstill Agreement that sought an assurance that Hyderabad would not accede to Pakistan, the Nizam had passed 2 ordinances, the first one that sought blocking of all exports from Hyderabad to other parts of India and the second one that declared the Indian currency as invalid in Hyderabad! The above fact not only shows his treachery towards India but also demolishes the theory that the Nizam was helpless under the rabid Razzakars as he was dependent on them to contain any uprising of the Hindu masses against his oppressive rule.
Qasim Rizvi the mind behind the radicalization of Razzakars dreamt of reestablishing the sultanate at Delhi to restore Islamic glory but this obnoxious tool of religious separatism to wield a totalitarian power was finally ousted not with tolerance or non-violence but an iron hand and an assertive strategy of ‘Operation Polo’ under Sardar Patel’s decisiveness and the Indian army’s able military assistance that got Hyderabad back into the Indian folds.
It’s been 70 years since the farmers’ rebellion against the Nizam’s atrocities that had forced him on his knees but no lessons seem to have been learnt as similar oppressive rules and feudalistic mindsets continue to rule unabated till date with the same formula of feudalistic Hindu administrators whose strings are pulled by the Islamic and Maoist (Christian) separatists.
The anti-India Razzakars have gotten themselves a new name and are contesting elections in the secular Indian state under the name of AIMIM, the peasants who were disillusioned by their oppressive Hindu landlords who were stooges of the Nizam, continue to be disillusioned or disinterested in the brutal past without realizing the dangers of its relapse. With no real Hindu consolidation or realization of their past mistakes in not taking the weaker classes along, the masses remain unsure of whether to trust the hare or the hound. Any dissent is easily diverted and diluted with divisions of unthinkable caste complexity within the Hindu fold in addition to the reveling evangelism that is quietly shielding its separatist head amidst the Hindu-Muslim rivalry.
The 12% who overpowered the 85% have today found their resurrected separatist hope in KCR who has announced Urdu as the second official language and is batting for a Wakf Act and a 12% quota for Muslims in education and employment. KCR’s growing impulsive or compulsive enthusiasm for Islamic causes makes one ponder if KCR is just a power smitten instrument leased out to realize the Razzakar’s original unfinished reverie? While the Congress seems complicit in the game throwing reminders like challenges at the KCR government on the matter of Muslim quota, the message is loud and clear _ it is all about the numbers and never about the nation or state, not even a notion of the nation!
Power games know no religion but religion is always the overloaded vehicle of a condescending polity because Jinnah, the man who was instrumental in carving out an Islamic Pakistan, dressed like a British, lived like a Christian, carried a Hindu blood and thought like a Muslim but at the end of the day when partition was planned, although Jinnah knew too well that statistically an entire Muslim population present in India could never be accommodated into a Pakistan and that culturally too, the Bengalis and Punjabi Muslims shared nothing in common except the radical rigidity of religion, yet he insisted on a partition because it was more about wielding power and less about religion which seems to be the reverberating truth in KCR’s Telangana today.
But with no Operation Polo in sight in the current scenario, can the people of Telangana and our constitutional machinery afford to let loose this Separatist Solo is to be waited and watched.