Telangana: Warring siblings kiss and make up

When N. Chandrababu Naidu and A. Revanth Reddy met in Hyderabad on 6 July, it was, curiously enough, the first formal engagement by the chief ministers of the two warring states since bifurcation 10 years ago. The bonhomie-filled event not only made for perfect optics but was also substantive in terms of efforts to resolve long-pending inter-state disputes. At least 14 issues are pending, including those pertaining to the division of assets, sharing of river waters, clearing power dues, and bifurcation of 91 institutions.

Both Naidu, in his first term (2014-19) and K. Chandrashekar Rao (2014-23) were too hostile to hold any meetings. When Jagan stormed to power in 2019, the deadlock continued as neither side was ready to cede any ground.

Naidu and Reddy were colleagues in the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) before the division of Andhra Pradesh, a tumultuous phase that set them on different political journeys and eventually put them at the helm of the two sibling states. Despite representing different sets of interests, the two leaders enjoy a good personal rapport, often likened in political circles to a guru-shishya equation.

Before the state’s division in 2014, Revanth rose from the TDP’s ranks to become the regional party’s deputy floor leader in the Assembly of combined Andhra Pradesh, and one of Naidu’s close confidants.

Following the creation of Telangana, changing dynamics made the TDP virtually irrelevant in the new state carved out of the old. (It did come to power in the residuary AP in 2014.) Charting his own political course, Revanth switched over to the Congress in 2017 and was appointed the Telangana PCC chief in 2021. He, in turn, steered the party to victory in December 2023. On his part, this year, Naidu led the NDA, comprising the TDP, Jana Sena Party and BJP, to an astounding victory in Andhra Pradesh.

The meeting this month helped break the ice between the two states. The two chief ministers met as old friends, hugging each other before they sat down at the negotiating table. The three-hour meeting decided to constitute a high-powered committee, comprising chief secretaries and two officials from each of the two states. Both sides presented a roadmap and discussed issues where the Centre’s intervention is required, as in the case of the Krishna and Godavari water-sharing dispute.

Bullying comedians is just not funny

BJP legislator from Hyderabad T. Raja Singh clearly has no sense of humour. His bullying led to the cancellation of a show by popular comedian Daniel Fernandes. The show, titled ‘Do you know who I am?’ — a less aggressive version of Jaanta Nahin Main Kaun Hoon — was called off following threats by Singh, who accused Fernandes of cracking an offensive joke against the Jain community.

The joke about Jains who disguised themselves as Muslims during Baqra Eid (Eid-ul-Azha) and bought 125 goats to rescue them from slaughter got the MLA’s goat. Following online threats, Fernandes was forced to delete the video teaser from his social media accounts.

Apologising to the Jain community, he said, “It is okay to disagree with an artist’s work, but to say that I will inflict violence upon an artist because I do not like his work isn’t the answer. There was no intention of maligning anybody here.”

Explaining the cancellation, he said, “Nobody is ready to guarantee the safety of my audience, my crew and myself. I do not want to put anyone in harm’s way because of something I said… To the members of the Jain community: I can see that you are upset. I can see that you are angry. It genuinely makes me sad. I do not like how I am feeling right now. I do not like how you are feeling right now. This is not what comedy is about. Comedy is all about all of us getting together and forgetting our worries and having a laugh.”

This is not the first time Singh has threatened a comedian with violence. In January 2022, he accused comedian and rapper Munawar Faruqui of hurting Hindu sentiments. Following the personal intervention of the then IT minister K.T. Rama Rao, Faruqui’s show was rescheduled to August that year and successfully held in a city auditorium, despite virulent protests by the BJP. Both the state government and Hyderabad Police faced heavy weather for their failure to stand by the comedian.

From software hub to surveillance city

Hyderabad, long reputed as India’s software hub, is fast turning into a surveillance city. As part of a ‘smart policing’ mission, ostensibly to profile criminals, the Telangana police have been using technologies that raise privacy concerns.

Launched in August 2018, Facial Recognition Technology (FRT) is being deployed through an existing setup of close-circuit television (CCTV) cameras. This means individuals are being subjected to intrusive surveillance without any warning, and without any information on how their sensitive personal data is being stored, shared, and used. In 2020, Telangana was top of the charts in terms of extensive application of FRT.

According to Ramesh Kanneganti, executive director of the Centre for Human Security Studies, FRT involves processing digital images of individuals’ faces for verification or identification using artificial intelligence. “It extracts specific data, based on facial expressions, hairstyle or shape of the face, and uses that data to compare with images of persons already profiled in their database,” he said.

“The FRT tool is arbitrary and an infringement on the right to privacy. There are no safeguards for citizens and no legal backing for implementing it. Unlike Aadhaar, which is mandated through an act of Parliament, there is no such regulation for FRT,” said social activist S.Q. Masood who filed a PIL (public interest litigation) in Telangana High Court. His view that FRT is being used for mass surveillance is shared by several pro-privacy activists.

Racing against time

The cash-strapped Congress government is grappling with twin challenges. One, fulfilling the promise of a farm loan waiver up to Rs 2 lakh. Two, increasing financial support under the ‘Rythu Bharosa’ scheme from Rs 10,000 per acre per annum to Rs 15,000.

Preliminary estimates show there are at least 47 lakh farmers in the state who have taken farm loans, the majority of whom have loans less than Rs 1 lakh. The government needs at least Rs 31,000 crore by 15 August, a deadline set by the chief minister.

According to official sources, the government is considering several options to reduce the burden, such as using data from the PM Kisan Scheme as a baseline to determine eligibility for the farm loan waiver. According to the scheme, there are approximately 33 lakh eligible beneficiaries, which would bring the figure needed down to Rs 25,000 crore. This would exclude state and Central government staff, income tax assessees and public representatives.

There is also a proposal to set up a special farmers’ welfare and development corporation to take over all the crop loans from the banks and repay them in instalments over 48 months. This will make farmers debt-free at one go unlike the crop loan waiver schemes implemented twice by the previous Bharat Rashtra Samithi government.