It would not be prudent to charge another blow on a defeated soldier. But then, at least for the sake of record, the lies and misrepresentations showered by Dr Parakala Prabhakar (TNIE, Feb 20) need to be corrected. At the outset, it seems Prabhakar should be reminded of Dr BR Ambedkar’s words: ‘’You cannot build anything on the foundations of caste. You cannot build up a nation, you cannot build up a morality. Anything that you will build on the foundations of caste will crack, and will never be a whole.” Of course, the word ‘caste’ should be replaced with ‘lies’ in the present case. His essay is full of lies in letter and spirit and here is an attempt to set the record straight on some of them.
He says that the introduction and passage of the Telangana Bill ‘’was against all norms of parliamentary democracy.” In fact, in the last 62 years of actually existing parliamentary democracy in the country, innumerable bills were passed in this manner and one cannot find fault with this one only.
He says ‘’only two members spoke - one from the ruling party and the other, the Leader of the Opposition - in addition to the Home Minister,” and ‘’there was no discussion on a Bill of far reaching consequences.” But if one cares to check on Lok Sabha website, it will be known that he was completely wrong and at least 12 members spoke and 5 others submitted written representations on the Bill. Many more members participated in the clause by clause debate.
Then Prabhakar tried to give his own blinkered version of history of the Bill, terming it ‘’indecent hurry’’ and ‘’dark secrecy.’’ As if he were substantiating his lie, he gave ‘’quick blow by blow account’’ to fool gullible readers. This account again is full of lies. He cited a 2002 resolution of Congress to counter July 2013 resolution. But he conveniently forgot Congress’ Election Manifesto of 2004, UPA’s Common Minimum Programme and Presidential Address to the joint session of Parliament in 2004. Much more happened between 2004 and July 2013 but Prabhakar wants to stick to 2002 resolution. Can anybody ask Prabhakar to stick to his earlier statement, of say early 1990s when he was in Congress or 1998 when he was in BJP, or 2007 when he was in PRP?
Then he quotes ‘’the resolution passed by both Houses of the state legislature against the move to divide the state” respectfully. What happened to the ‘’norms of parliamentary democracy’’ he was referring to just a few moments ago? Everybody knows how the AP legislature and council bulldozed through voice vote on the resolution. If at all, one would say, Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha voice votes were a tit for tat.
Prabhakar says the division of AP ‘’marks the departure from the linguistic organisation of the political map of India.’’ If there was any departure from linguistic organisation, it was long back in 1955 when States Reorganisation Commission said: ‘’After a full consideration of the problem in all its aspects, we have come to the conclusion that it is neither possible nor desirable to reorganize States on the basis of the single test of either language or culture, but that a balanced approach to the whole problem is necessary in the interests of our national unity”. (SRC Report, para 162) And then a number of states in Hindi belt and two states for Tamil, hundreds of languages going without a state show how fallacious is the linguistic argument. On another level, one could argue that one State cannot have two languages (which again is impossible in India), but one language can have as many states as required.
Then he castigated both the Congress and BJP for their ganging up or whatever. This, to give him due credit, may not be a lie and he should be knowing the character of both the parties more than anybody else, since he was insider for some time.
Telangana formation was neither in hurry, nor in undemocratic fashion as he misinterprets. It took exactly 60 years since States Reorganisation Commission recommended it in December 1955. It was not at all undemocratic since at least 26 parties gave consent letters to Pranab Mukherjee Committee during 2004-2006 and a couple of other parties later. Since December 7, 2009 at least five all-party meets were held and the opinion of each and every party was elicited.
Whatever be the motive behind spreading these lies, now the time has come to bury all those lies and move on. Now Telangana is a reality and nobody gets anything by arousing passions against Telangana cause through blatant lies. Let Telugu people in both states live in harmony and help each other. Telangana people were not fighting against people of Coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema and the fight was only against unjust ruling policies and rulers. Now that Telangana succeeded in removing the yoke, let people of both regions continue to live in friendship and cooperation. Don’t entertain lies to further the unwarranted animosity.
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Task of Twin States Is to Restore Amity [ Editorial]