Corrigendum about Sri Krishna Committee report

I have realized that in my enthusiasm I have also behaved like the TV channels. The Home Minister has appeared on TV and said that the Sri Krishna Committee has suggested not five but six options and that previous news reports on TV were not accurate. I cannot fully recollect the six but I will try.

1. Status Quo

2. Separate Rayalseema+Andhra and Telangana. Hyderabad as Union Territory and the two states to develop their own capitals

3. Rayalseema+Telangana and Andhra with Hyderabad as integral part of the former

4. Andhra+Rayalseema, Andhra and an enlarged Hyderabad as Union Territory and acting as common capital.

5. Andhra+Rayalseema and Telangana with Hyderabad as an integral part of Telangana and as its exclusive capital.

6. United Andhra Pradesh with special constitutionally recognized boards for development of the Telangana region.

The Union Home Minister has said that the first three options have been rejected as impractical by the committee itself and that options 4,5 and 6 need to be explored. TV channels claim that the Home Minister has also said that of the three option number six is the most practical and desirable. I hope I have got the options right but there is a very good possibility that I have not, since there is a great deal of confusion. So please read these carefully, as in there could be errors in the information since there is still some confusion. My apologies of the errors of the previous post and for these ones as well. Initial reactions of the Telangana parties as well as self proclaimed intellectuals are on predictable lines. They have rejected the report, ensuring that a prolonged and painful struggle is in the offing. Already I could not get to my work place with riot police not allowing us into the University. Now I don't know when I can get to work, if at all. Good times for politicians and not so good ones for common people, but then that is usually the case, isn't it?

Sri Krishna Committee report is out

All TV news channels have started telecasting the five directives or five possibilities that have been identified by the Sri Krishna Committee which has submitted its report. The five possibilities apparently as per news channels are

1. United Andhra Pradesh (Status Quo)

2. United Andhra Pradesh with three separate development boards exclusively for Telangana

3. Creation of a Union Territory that will encompass Hyderabad, Ranga Reddy, Nalgonda and Mahbub Nagar Districts

4. Creation of a new State which will have Rayalseema and Telangana as one state and Andhra as the other with Hyderabad as the Capital for both.

5. Division of the Andhra Pradesh State into Telangana and Andhra (presumably with Hyderabad as Joint Capital, but this thing is not very clear yet).

Though this post is based on media bedlam and lot of other noise, it is possibly too early to get critical of the Sri Krishna Committee report. On the face of it, this is nothing new. Post the 1969 separate Telangana agitation there was a creation of a board for specific development in Telangana. Nobody knows where that is now. Union Territory is old hat and lot of people have been asking for that. Rayalseema and Telangana as one was proposed by J C Diwakar Reddy (Congress Party) and endorsed by Asaduddin Owaisi (MIM). They both said they prefer status quo or a United Andhra Pradesh but if a split had to happen they wanted it this way. Separate Andhra with Rayalseema on one side and Telangana on the other is the demand of the TRS.

So on the face of things it appears that the committee has only reiterated what has come through in the form of various demands. As I have said this is probably to early to comment since the report is claimed to be an 800 page one and some of the leaks in the papers have said that the committee believed that there was no angle to believe that backwardness was the exclusive feature of Telangana alone. What is obvious is that the setting up of the committee was to buy time and prepare to take a decision and also prepare a strategy to deal with the fall out of the decision. It is obvious that a full circle has been drawn and the ball is back in the Central Government's court. The decision will therefore be political without anyone knowing what the people of the state really want. A few people have remarked that this imbroglio is a result of the hasty announcement made by Home Minister P C Chidambaram that fateful December night in 2009. In which all we can say is oh politicians what have you done? And maybe we should also ask what more will you do?

P.S. Not proof read. Errors maybe excused.

P.P.S: Parts of this post are inaccurate. There are six options and not five.

What is Telangana?

The Sri Krishna Committee report has been submitted. The Indian Home Minister has called for a meeting of representatives of eight recognized political parties from Andhra Pradesh to discuss the contents of the report. Of these eight parties the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have decided to not attend the meet. Some parties have been saying that they will send only one representative instead of the two that have been asked for by the Union Government. The situation is very intriguing, akin to one rider trying to ride two horses or one sailor trying to sail to boats, at the same time. It looks like political parties do not want to miss out on opportunities, after all what is opportunism if you don't maximize opportunities. As I said in a previous post all political parties except the TRS have two factions one representing United Andhra Pradesh and the other representing the cause of a Separate Telangana State. I still cannot figure out how a party stands for two opposing causes at the same time. It is like having the cake and eating it too or maybe they stand for this also and that also. This is reflective of politics that is careerist and not based in the desire to serve people. Politics is the best way to amass wealth without being accountable to the people or to the income tax department. But all this does not seem to answer the question as to what Telangana is.

The question is no conundrum. In fact, it is pretty straight forward once we understand that it means different things to different people. So here is what it is.

The hope of the hopeless.

Don't let the phraseology above mislead you into thinking that I am mocking someone. I am not. I am expressing my sympathies for the hopeless. The hopeless are those who do not have a hope. So who are they? These are students who have degrees but no education and therefore do not have prospects of any kind of decent employment. I am sad to say that the a few days ago I attested certificates of post-graduates who were settling for jobs as police constables. These people cannot even dream of jobs in the private sector. But the opportunities of employment in the government sector are next to nil since years and years of giving salaries to non-working people has depleted most of the governments' money. And the unproductive are still there taking salaries and later pension. But the unemployed now believe that with the formation of the Telangana state opportunities of employment in the government sector will once again come to the fore. After all, the TRS leadership has been saying that for sometime now. So jobs for the unemployed or perhaps jobs for the otherwise unemployable.

The greenfield

An opportunity where everyone starts at the same time. A brand new race, where there are no historical disadvantages. Time to get into the most sought after and enriching career of all; politics. The last one year is the preparation time that all aspiring politicians who seek to run the race have used to build muscle in the right places to push the others out of the race and become winners by planting their flags. New state, new opportunities to find new riches. The people who see it this way are the ones who talk about a social justice Telangana.

Restoration of lost glory

The traditional upper castes of Telangana mainly the Reddys and to a certain extent the Velamas have bemoaned the fact that the more progressive and capitalist Kammas from coastal Andhra have snatched their traditional feudal advantage and the power that accrued with it. So here is an opportunity to drive out the usurpers and re-establish the golden past.

Easy money

There are functionaries of various Telangana outfits who have used and continue to use the Telangana label to exclude people from the 'original sons of the soil' category and then extort monies out of them and give permissions to the settlers to continue with their businesses in Hyderabad. Any crime committed will go down as a fight for a free and fair Telangana of the original sons of the soil.

Clean slate

A new Telangana means a new state and a new everything. Ideal opportunity to become part of the mainstream again by expunging all the inconvenient police records etc. Like taking a dip in the Ganga and cleansing all past sins.

This is not any fanciful cynicism on my part. It is what the situation is. In my university in the last few days there have been instances when interviews were conducted for admission into the Ph.D programme some students have accused teachers of colluding to get in students from Coastal Andhra, when no such thing was happening. Therefore right now Telangana is the glorious situation when there is no administration and therefore anyone can do anything through extortion. Towards the end of the first paragraph of this post I had talked about new political careers based in opportunism. So while Telangana means different things to different people ultimately it boils down to the opportunism of politicians and political parties. In this game the common people will give their support this way or that but ultimately nothing will happen to change the position that they are in. It is all like in a company where a management changes but means very little to the employees. I continue to bemoan the fact that politics are run by the unenlightened who will only ultimately destroy the integrity of the country. I can only hope that despite all this, maybe God has something positive for the people of this region and the country as a whole. Amen.

P.S. No proof reading done. As usual request to overlook mistakes of grammar and spelling.

I fear for India and its future.

These days I carry a lot of guilt. The reason is that I go to work everyday find that there are no classes, I sit around doing some other work that is there to be done in the department and I come back home. The rate at which things are going, the time when I will forget teaching is not too far away. I carry guilt because of the salary I take. What I get as salary is comparable to what some people get in the corporate sphere. The difference is in the amount of work that we put in. While I put in none, the people who earn the equivalent of what I earn have their noses rubbed into the ground with work. Every week numbers are crunched and performance evaluated for them. For us in the university system, there is no such thing. We are the freest people in the true sense of the term. We get our salary on time and we have no accountability. We don't have to teach, we don't even have to turn up for work everyday (some of us do that once in a week if we have a bit of conscience left and some turn up once in a month or so), we don't have to answer anyone for anything and yet at the end of the month we get our salaries. No wonder then most of us have other things to do by the side. Some of us own marriage halls, farms, hotels and restaurants and other kind of businesses. When we don't have anything like this then we turn revolutionaries, ready to bite the hand that feeds us.

And we are good at forming Joint Action Committees with students and non-teaching staff. In a truly revolutionary way we march hand in glove with our comrades from the student community and the non-teaching staff community and ensure that there is no work for anyone to do. The joint action committees are the bane of the university system. When students are drawn into the politics of teachers and vice-versa, where is the sanctity of the student-teacher relationship? By walking together shoulder to shoulder we have destroyed the possibility of ever setting an example to students. Do not get me wrong here. There is nothing wrong with being friendly with students and being supportive when they need you in matters of academics. What I am against is using the students to settle scores with fellow faculty members or using their revolutionary potential for the satisfaction of one's own greedy needs. In matters of learning and education a teacher and student should be together, but not for things that I have specified above. These days the transactions between students and teachers are about things which are anything but academic.

Universities were supposed to be free spaces, where people could do free thinking without the fear of anything and without any limitations being imposed upon them. Today they are free spaces where anyone can do anything except that which they are supposed to do. Unaccountability is the word to describe what happens and I am ashamed to say that this is reaching criminal proportions. Consider the fact that we are paid by the tax payers money and you will see why I have used the term criminal. Expenditures on universities is in thousands of crores and if they are nowhere near what is expected of them and in many instances are against what is expected of them, then is it not criminal?

Many of the teachers in my own university are aware of this. But since most of them want to be another power centre they do not wish to change anything. But they are also very clever people. Many of them have ensured that their off spring do not study the subjects that they teach and also have sent them to still functional universities and colleges in other parts of the country so that they their children can study peacefully and uninterruptedly while they the teachers with their assured salaries and unaccountability wreak havoc on the university, education system and politics of the state. The other day I was chatting with some colleagues about appointment of Vice-Chancellors. I said that the appointments were too political and that people from within the university should not become Vice-Chancellor of that university since it is difficult to function. Someone said that nobody would allow a person from outside of the university to be appointed as Vice-Chancellor and even if such a person is appointed he would not be allowed to function. I was aghast. Have we reached the level where we dictate things such as the appointment of VCs? I was told that there is nothing wrong with this thinking since we are living in a democratic system. I then suggested that we should simply have nominations for Vice-Chancellorships and have a VC elected by the teachers, other staff and students of the university. They thought I was trivialising a serious issue. But I am sure you now know why I fear for India and its future.

P.S. My usual disclaimer. Not proof read and hence mistakes of grammar and spelling will abound. Please read around them. Thank you.

What is the future for India with the education system completely collapsed?

I have to say that these days I am worried. Going to the campus and not having much to do is not only demoralizing but also very bad on my conscience. Everyday I ask myself, what is it for that I am being paid? Today as university teachers we draw salaries that are somewhat comparable to the ones drawn in the corporate world. I know the amount of pressure that the corporate world puts its people through on a person whose pay is comparable to mine. Here we seem to not accountable to anyone. I have been saying that most of the teachers in the university system and definitely in my university have no business being there. I find it difficult to digest the fact that they form Joint Action Committees with students and together they subvert and sabotage the system.

I cannot simply understand the logic of joint action committees. I can only say that they are a part of the pragmatic politics that are the norm of the day. Everyone is willing to form a joint action committee with anyone else if they can meet the goals that they want. Ethics and social responsibility are words that are totally alien to most people. It is as if the dictum of ends justify means is somehow self justifying. And this in the land of Gandhi who said that there was no way in which ends and means could be separated. A legitimate end is one that follows only morally sustainable means. With joint action committees involving the teachers and the students already the moral basis is dissolved, since morally and ethically students and teachers can come together on one platform only for issues that further education and learning. I know of so many instances teachers who have incited students against others have faced the wrath of the same set of students. Yet no one seems to be willing to learn lessons and so the tradition continues aided and abetted by the pragmatism of the politics of today.

It is sad to see that universities, especially mine seemed to have forgotten that they have been set up to impart education and knowledge. A university is only as good as its staff and students. In our case it is obvious that both teachers and staff are unwilling to treat education even as an incidental thing in the satisfaction of their self interests. To say that in all this education is a casualty is understating of an understatement. Teachers see the income they get in the form of salaries as a karmic due and therefore do not feel the necessity to work in order to justify them. They therefore move on to other things such as real estate, restaurants, farms, retail stores to supplement their income. And since these demand their presence on a regular basis they are to found here rather than in universities. With full salary fully assured and with no accountability of any variety they are happy to turn revolutionaries fighting for fissiparous causes.

P.S: I had written this post a while ago and as I was writing my internet connection was lost. I forgot about and only remembered it now. As it is with all self aggrandizing people I did not have the heart to just delete this post. So here it is, out of sync with the other posts. But bear with me please.

Politics of pragmatism and the death of integrity

I must say that looking at the last few days, politics have now reached a stage where they have become repulsive. In the land of Gandhi, where fasting was linked with Satyagraha which in itself was the anger that came out of moral integrity for the upholding of truth, today fasting is linked to farce. Last year Mr. K. Chandrashekar Rao of the TRS went on a fast. He is apparently diabetic, hypertensive apart from some more chronic ailments. Yet the man was able to 'fast'for 12 days or more. Chandrababu Naidu 'fasted'for a week a few days ago. Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy, son of former Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, Dr. Rajashekar Reddy 'fasted'along with one lakh people. Now the Congress Party legislators from Telangana are 'fasting' for a cause. The cause is the Telangana separation. In the Osmania University, at the drop of a hat, students go on an indefinite 'fast'. Somehow I cannot understand why there is a shortage of onions and vegetables with so many people fasting all the time. The situation should have been that of a glut in the vegetable markets.

I could understand the various fasts taken up by members of opposition parties. What beats me and boggles my completely is the protest fasts undertaken by the members of the ruling Congress Party. This must be the height of democracy, where the ruling party is protesting against itself. Or is this the height of irony, or idiocy or the complete lack of integrity? As the 31st of December, 2010 draws ever closer and the Sri Krishna Committee report on the verge of being presented political parties are waiting in the wings to see which way the wind blows and to fly in that direction. So all parties other than the TRS have two factions. Telangana men and Andhra men. If the verdict seems like a separate Telangana then the K. Keshav Rao faction in the Congress Party and the Nagam Janardana Reddy group in the the Telugu Desam Party will swing into action for it while, Lagadapati Rajgopal from the Congress and Yerran Naidu from the Telugu Desam party will fight it. The situation will get reversed if the committee is for the maintenance of a United Andhra Pradesh.

Meanwhile students are still bearing the brunt of all this. For some days now there has been a problem with students of MBA and MCA standing divided over the question of writing exams. On the campus of the Osmania University there have been two groups one for writing exams and the other for boycotting them and these have indulged in a shouting match. Finally, the politicians who matter decided to end this kiddish wrangling and brought in a mature decision. They threatened students and colleges with dire consequences if exams were conducted. So finally the issue has been put to rest. In this near chaotic situation everybody and anybody can call for a bandh and cripple the system. On the Osmania University campus groups of students of up to ten go around shouting slogans and getting the classes suspended.

What ails the State of Andhra Pradesh and the country is this politics of pragmatism. No body stands for anything. No ideology, no morality and no integrity. All that people want is power, so that they can make truck loads of money. With politics becoming a bottomless pit, I wonder what is in store for the people of this state and country?

P.S. Not proof read and hence mistakes of grammar and spelling may be excused.

Thoughts on what will be.

The Sri Krishna Committee is going to submit its report at anytime now. The thing is that I have started writing this blog because of the events surrounding the separate Telangana agitation. People think that the Committee's report will now decide the issue this way or that. Before I write further, I will make it my position on the issue clear. I have said then and I am saying now that I do not stand for the division of the State of Andhra Pradesh. I have commented at length as to why I feel this way. I am from Telangana and this region is very, very dear to me. But I do not think that the kind of politics that are prevalent now will result in the realization of the aspirations of common people of Telangana. It is very clear that the issue has taken on many other dimensions and most of those are those which do not portend to the well being of either the people of this region or of India. India stands to lose with the kind of politics that this articulation of the problem will unleash on the people.

I believe I am objective and therefore let me make another thing very clear. Have the people of Telangana lost something because of being dominated by the Andhra region's people. YES. Is the solution proposed to it the answer. NO. This is a complex question that brooks no easy answers. Knee jerk reactions and jingoism will not get anyone anywhere. In fact, the mess now is the result of such practices in the past. Let me draw an analogy here. If somebody is being sucked down by quicksand the instinctive thing to do would be to thrash around. But that hastens the process of being sucked in and drowned. This situation too is similar. This is the time to sit with a level head and deliberate on the way forward. True liberal democracy is premised in the notion of deliberation and overcoming of obstacles by the use of the faculties of reason and logic. Today in all the shouting that is going on from both sides of the line dividing the people any voice of rationality and logicality is lost. Sanity is lost in the noise of posturing emanating from both sides. The whole thing is now rooted in collective egos of both the sides. Even a small step back is being considered as a defeat and therefore the issue is stalemated. A third person arbitrating in a fight between two will only be able to encourage the two sides to take another look at their positions. But the resolution will only be possible only when the two locked in the dispute want to find it. I have no hope of anything like that happening here. Even if the position is that the State of Andhra Pradesh will remain as it is (a position that is on the face of it consistent with what I want) the people of both regions have already lost a lot and none of that will be retrieved in the future. It will only accelerate the process of deteriorating relations between the two peoples who stand divided. The only solution to this is therefore opening a dialogue between the two sides. Deliberation and acceptance of wrong positions and wrong doing will only be the way forward. Any other way is a way downward and therefore not desirable.

In all this my sympathies with the students of Telangana. I do not think that the students of Andhra has lost as much as those here and therefore I am not extending my sympathies there. People have died here for the cause, lost academic opportunities and opportunities in life and all this in my opinion for nothing. They to me symbolise the character of Boxer the horse in the novel Animal Farm by George Orwell. Needless to say everyone knows who the pigs are. To sum up my feelings for the students I quote two different sets of lyrics written by Roger Waters, my favourite poet and musician. The first set of lines are from "Us and Them" a song from the Dark Side of the Moon.

Forward he cried from the rear, and the front ranks died.

The Generals sat, while the lines on the map moved from side to side (Roger Waters)

The other lyric is a bit longer but equally important

You know that I care what happens to you,

And I know that you care for me too,

So I don't feel alone, on the way to the stone,

Now that I've found somewhere safe to bury my bone,

Any fool knows a dog needs a home, a shelter from pigs on the wing. (Roger Waters)

This lyric is from "Animals" almost a continuation of the Animal Farm by Orwell. I live in hope, otherwise why live at all? I hope that all of us do what is appropriate for us to do. Deliberate and not fall prey to pigs on the wing.

P.S. Not proof read. Mistakes may be excused.