BC Reservation - NTR

Political stunt

Andhra Pradesh CM N.T. Rama Rao announces increase in reservation for backward classes

Amarnath K. Menon  August 15, 1986 | UPDATED 12:28 IST

 

Dressed in flowing saffron, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N.T. Rama Rao was in his element. His cabinet had just had a short-notice meeting in Hyderabad's historic Jubilee Hall, the first time that it had met outside the secretariat. And now he was informing the 3,000-strong cheering crowd of supporters of the momentous decision that the Cabinet had taken: to increase the reservation for the backward classes in colleges and Government jobs from 25 to 44 per cent. 

"You are not backward. The society is backward and we have taken this step to reform the society," he thundered, as fire-crackers greeted the announcement of the hike in reservations. And when Rama Rao added: "The law that prevails today is for big fish to eat small fish and our government has taken the side of the small fish in this battle," he almost brought the house down.

But neither all the brouhaha which surrounded the announcement, nor the subsequent campaign whipped up in favour of it, have been able to hide the fact that this was yet another decision that the populist Rama Rao was herded into taking. And like many other decisions taken by his government in haste, this also has led to a reaction which Rama Rao could not have foreseen. Though a Gujarat-style anti-reservation stir is yet to materialise, students in colleges across the state have been split into "forwards" and "backwards" and the growing antagonism is posing a threat to law and order in over 15 towns where students have gone on strike and called bandhs.

Rama Rao announcing reservation policy: populist ploys

The sequence of events leading to the Government's decision tells its own tale. The Rama Rao Cabinet had its fortnightly meeting on July 1 but there was no mention of this major decision that day. But between July 1 and July 4. Rama Rao received intelligence reports that a convention of leaders of backward classes, mostly owing allegiance to the Congress(I) and scheduled to be addressed by Union External Affairs Minister P. Shiv Shanker, was likely to swing the backward classes solidly behind the Congress(I). With an estimated 200 representatives from each of the 100-odd backward castes in the state likely to attend the convention, it could turn out to be the most impressive collection of backward caste leaders in recent times.

As the backward castes comprise 52 per cent of the state's population of over 60 million, Rama Rao was understandably alarmed. On July 4, he ordered that the N.K. Muralidhara Rao Commission report on reservations submitted in 1982 (before he came to power), be examined. The same day he decided that the commission's recommendation - to raise the percentage from 25 to 44 - would be immediately accepted by the Government. Members of the Cabinet were informed of the emergency meeting scheduled for the next day, and of the agenda. Rama Rao added his own bit by stipulating an income limit of Rs.12,000 annually for those eligible to benefit from the new policy.

Rama Rao's decision managed to take the sting out of the convention but Shiv Shanker called it "a political stunt" and warned: "The hike in reservations is a plot to incite people of the higher castes to challenge the decision in a court of law and thus get the whole process stalled." The convention, which ended in the setting up of the Andhra Pradesh Backward Classes Sangham (APBCS) with Congress(I) MP T. Bala Goud as president, instead turned its ire on the income limit, calling for its withdrawal if the "Government was really interested in the welfare of the backward classes".

Opposition from the higher castes also emerged soon enough. The first banner of revolt went up in Osmania University with the formation of the Andhra Pradesh Nava Sangharshana Samithi (APNSS) "to protect the interest of the forward classes". In less than a week the agitation spread to the districts with students boycotting classes and examinations to take out processions and hold meetings condemning the Government's decision. Says APNSS Convenor K. Ravindra Reddy: "We are not against reservations for the oppressed but against the decision to increase it to illogical proportions."

With the pro-reservationists launching their own body - the Andhra Pradesh Sama Sangrama Parishad (APSSP) - which has clear support from Telugu Desam leaders - the stage was being set for a battle of attrition. As experience in numerous states - Gujarat, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra - has shown, it is impossible to appease the upwardly mobile and politically powerful backward castes without triggering violent passions in the higher castes who feel that reservations should have been ended long ago. With the APNSS calling for a state-wide bandh this month, the movement against the increase in reservations was slowly - and ominously - gaining in strength.

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