Come June 2 the umbilical cord between Andhra Pradesh and Telangana is going to be severed forever as Hyderabad ceases to be the common capital of the two States. The AP Reorganisation Act of 2014 had mandated that Andhra Pradesh can use Hyderabad as its capital for ten years.
While Andhra Pradesh has moved all its executive operations to Amaravati over eight years ago, and is well prepared, the messy parts of the split — the division of assets as enumerated in Schedules 9 and 10 — still remains unresolved. “It has not moved an inch in the last 10 years,” said a State official.
While Schedule 9 talked about the division of State Public Sector Units, Schedule 10 listed out training institutes that are required to be shared between the two States.
The two sides could achieve some success concerning the division of Andhra Pradesh Bhavan in New Delhi and the division of over 60,000 employees in the State cadre. But for the rest, there are still disputes.
The Sheela Bhide Committee, appointed to recommend a formula for the division of State PSUs, had submitted its recommendations, some in favour of Andhra Pradesh, while others in favour of Telangana. Telangana raised objections about the division of 22 out of the 91 PSUs, resulting in a stalemate.
Meanwhile, Andhra Pradesh Chief Secretary KS Jawahar Reddy wrote to his Telangana counterpart A Santhi Kumari, saying the State wanted to retain at least three structures (Lake View Guest House, Hermitage Office Complex Building, and the CID Headquarters).
“We have already handed over buildings such as the Secretariat and BRKR Bhavan. With regard to others, we are yet to make a decision,” he said.
Power sector dues
Andhra Pradesh is also demanding its sibling to pay the dues to the tune of ₹7,000 crore for the power that it supplied to Telangana. “We feel that it is essential to have our presence here till the issues are fully resolved,” the AP Chief Secretary asserted.
Meanwhile, the Telugu Desam Party feels the onus is on the Centre and Telangana to resolve the knotty issues. “With 107 training institutions listed under Schedule 10 and 89 government companies and corporations under Schedule 9 which were set up under the United AP and total value of the assets to be apportioned between both States is estimated at ₹1,42,601 crore, the stakes are definitely high for both States,” N Vijay Kumar, TDP spokesperson, said.
The Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS), which spearheaded the movement for separate Statehood for Telangana, cautioned against moves to extend the deadline for continuing Hyderabad as common capital. “We will also oppose any move to make Hyderabad a Union Territory,” T Harish Rao, senior BRS leader and nephew of BRS President K Chandrashekar Rao, said.