Conveniently Ignoring Vidarbha

A D-Day or rather a T-Day in the political history of Andhra and Telangana, was marked on 9th December 2010 when the Central UPA government agreed to take further the demands of a separate Telangana state to be carved out of North Andhra region. This, coming weeks after some intense and often violent agitation by members of the TRS party workers, Osmania University students and people & students from elsewhere in the districts representing the Telangana region. The period of turmoil marked burning of public properties, damaging malls and private establishments, roadblocks, rallies, suicides, stopping trains, gate-crashing into assembly and virtually holding the state government to ransom as well as putting the common man in the city of Hyderabad and elsewhere into great inconvenience and continuous threat. Result; Government bowing down to the pressure and agreeing to set up a Panel under Sri Krishna Commission to discuss the viability of a separate Telangana state. Although after 12 months of the farcical process wasting exchequers time and money they submitted a report which had nothing path-breaking or possible solution for the cause. The bone of contention being the city of Hyderabad, with both Telangana and Andhra unwilling to let go of the city, which has seen tremendous development on all fronts in the past decade and is the major revenue source for the state.

The reason for presenting this as a prologue to the subject of the topic is that, perhaps this could very well serve as an ingredient or war-plan for the people of Vidarbha, who have a deep yet un-ignited aspiration to see an independent state of Vidarbha. Also unlike the contentious issue of state capital, Vidarbha is well served with Nagpur as its unanimous capital city, bejeweled with all attributes befitting the citadel of an independent state. The culturally and socially peace loving people of Vidarbha have remained much calmer during the communal troubles than the rest of India, and have not been very vocal or effusive in their support for a separate state. Unlike some smaller states which were carved out during the last decade based on language or political situations, a separate Vidarbha state is justified not only because of if continuous abandon by the rest of Maharashtra but also for its distinct demography, culture and need to develop and establish a distinct identity.

In recent times, there have been few calls for a separate state of Vidarbha, due to the continuous apathy from the Government of Maharashtra towards this region and the inept and opportunistic political leadership in Vidarbha. Though being culturally, politically and financially diverse than the rest of Maharashtra, the calls to a separate state come in picture only when the leaders from this region are marginalized by the other higher authorities in the state government or at the time of elections. The selfish leaders of Vidarbha have been raising this issue to bake their own bread, often pressuring the government for getting a cabinet seat in the Maharashtra assembly or to get some plum portfolio from wherein they can fill their coffers. A major antagonism for the cause of Vidarbha has come from Shiv Sena, who does not want their influence to be confined only to the Western Maharashtra and Konkan, as well as to counter the MNS who have not found many takers amongst the peace loving people of Vidarbha. Even top leadership of NCP has been ignorant about the plight of the region and its demand for severance from Maharashtra.

The earliest dated demand for a separate identity for Vidarbha statehood has been noted as long back as 1905 when the Maha Vidarbha movement was voiced for separation from the CP & Berar region. However since there have been but a few and unheard voices being raised for a statehood. Votaries for Vidarbha find their most forceful argument in the recommendation of the State Re-organization Commission under Justice Fazal Ali (Para 8 of the Commission's report of 1955) which favored "an independent state of Vidarbha" for it to become "fully self-reliant and viable". Promises to grant Vidarbha more than its share, made in the Nagpur and Akola pacts, have been empty ones. In 1971-73 the agitation was at its peak when Jambuwantrao Dhote had undertaken a 21-day fast to highlight the cause. He was later elected to the Lok Sabha as an Independent candidate on the same plank and on that achievement the issue subsequently went down the cold basket. The Dandekar committee on regional imbalances noted in 1980 that the per capita development expenditure was Rs 222 for Mumbai, but a mere seven rupees for Vidarbha. Also, while per capita crop loans of Rs 76 were distributed to farmers of western Maharashtra, those in Vidarbha received only Rs 22. Many of the 125 irrigation projects planned for the region remains incomplete and only eight per cent of the total area is irrigated. The situation has only further worsened in the recent past. The imbalance continues on the industrial front too. The growth in employment between in western Maharashtra was significantly higher than in Vidarbha, in spite of the fact that the region has more than 60 per cent of the forest wealth and 80 per cent of the mineral wealth of the state and produces more than half of states share of generated power. Clearly, these disparities are fuelling public sympathy for a separate state.

In recent past leaders like Satish Chaturvedi, NKP Salve, Vasant Sathe, Banwarilal Purohit, Ranjit Deshmukh, Sharad Joshi, among others have been vociferous in support of Vidarbha state, but the issue raises its head only during the elections and once the leaders get their desired positions the demand gets dumped for another 5 years. Few of the leader’s in-spite of holding major and influential positions in the State & Central Government and their respective party working committees, have not been able to do anything worthwhile for the regions cause. Shetkari Sangathan, Vidarbha Rajya Party, Vidarbha Rajya Nirman Congress, Swatantra Vidarbha Rajya Samanvay Samiti, Vidarbha Sena, Vidarbha Parishad and Vidarbha Rajya Congress Steering Committee any many other vote garnering parties were formed over the time but all of them failed to have any impact on the Central Leadership to press for the demand. And people of Vidarbha too, sensing their opportunistic agenda didn’t show any enthusiasm in supporting the personal motives of these parties for the separate Vidarbha’s cause. Vidarbha has given many important leaders to the country from our present President Pratibha Patil (from Amravati) to erstwhile Late Prime Minister Narsimha Rao (represented Ramtek Lok Sabha constituency), and has been one of the important citadels of the Indian Freedom Movement be it in Nagpur or Sewagram, but the region has been always been given a step-motherly treatment by political parties on the national scale. The issue came to light when Salve and Sathe resigned from Congress party upon receiving a negative response from Sonia Gandhi on the demand to bring up the statehood of Vidarbha, but even this move was no more than a ploy by the leaders to bring the spotlight upon their dwindling political career rather than the gross adversities and neglect being faced by the people of the region.

Separate Vidarbha – Viable and More

Vidarbha occupies 31.6% of total area and holds 21.3% (over 26 million) of total population of Maharashtra. Situated in central India Vidarbha has its own rich cultural and historical background distinct from rest of Maharashtra. A majority of Vidarbhites speak Varhadi a dialect of Marathi and Hindi. The region is famous for growing oranges and cotton. Vidarbha holds two-thirds of Maharashtra’s mineral resources, three quarters of its forest resources and is a net producer of power. Vidarbha generates around 3600 MW power through the thermal and hydro-power plants at several places, with Chandrapur Super Thermal Power Station (CSTPS), being one of the biggest in Asia. Still, there are the daily power cuts in the region for 5-8 hrs in towns and 10-12 hrs in the rural areas of Vidarbha, while the people of Mumbai, Thane and Pune continue to enjoy 24 hours of uninterrupted power supply to cater to their extravagant lifestyle. Recently a study conducted by the Times Group pointed out the gross injustice and health risk being meted out to people of Vidarbha, in terms of air and water pollution through a deliberate and meticulous plan for power generation set-up. While the polluting and heat generating sources of electricity vis-a-vis the thermal power plants numbering more than 47 are being planned to be setup in Nagpur-Chandrapur-Yavatmal belt, which aleady has established and significant number of coal based thermal power setups, sufficient for the region. This the study pointed out will lead to large amount of particulate matter and other air pollutants being released in the atmosphere of the region, putting the health of people and animals at risk. The effluents released by these power plants will also cause huge amount of soil and water pollution thus indirectly affecting the agricultural produce of the nearby regions and also diverting a huge quantity of irrigation water to these gas guzzlers in an already draught prone region. This being done, when simultaneously much cleaner sources of power generation being planned in Konkan and Western Maharashtra region, like Nuclear and Hydroelectric based power plants. People of Vidarbha are at loss to decipher such step-motherly treatment being meted out to them regularly in the name of pseudo-development. The much vaunted Model Solar City project for Nagpur city is yet to see sunlight, for which 2012 has been marked as the deadline. In the end again citing lack of resource and funding in Nagpur, these corrupt power-mongers of Mumbai will shift the project to either Pune or Nasik or some remote ghetto of Konkan in the name of development.

Agriculturally too Vidarbha has been self sustaining, with cotton, oranges and soya beans being the main cash crops. The Orange city - Nagpur and Amravati are the largest Orange growing regions. Traditional crops as jowar, bajra and rice are grown and exported extensively from the region, with Gondia being the largest rice growing district. However, recently Vidarbha region has become infamous for a large number of farmer suicides occurring. The farmers in the region are living in the worst condition compared to the rest of India. There have been more than 32,000 farmer’s suicides in Maharashtra in a decade, of which 70% being in the 11 districts of Vidarbha region. The figure has been 892 in 2009, with approximately 95% of the cotton growers of Vidarbha under massive debt. This is mainly due lack of ample amount of water resources, lack of new technologies or proper financial aid or debt schemes by the ministry and due to the negligence of the state govt. towards the farmers needs. The main crop in Vidarbha being Cotton, but the farmers growing it don't get their share from the govt., which has lead to the high distress among them, leading to the massive suicides. Due to the absence of any responsible counseling either from the government or society there were many farmers who did not know how to survive in the changing economy. Such stresses pushed many into a corner where suicide became an option for them. This also led the farmers and others in this region to make a call for a separate Vidarbha state. The recent fiasco of Rahul Gandhi and his patronizing a widow Kalavati; whose husband committed suicide, brought the plight of farmers of Vidarbha in national picture, resulting in the PM announcing a grand relief package for the riots. But as with the earlier declared or promised measures this too remained either only on paper or money never reaching the sufferers.

The Chandrapur, Gondia, Gadchiroli, Bhandara and Nagpur Districts form the main mineral belt, with coal and manganese as the major minerals. Chandrapur district alone contributes 29% of all mineral output of Maharashtra. Iron ore and limestone are identified as potential mining resources. Though rich in minerals, coal, forests and mountains, this region is always underdeveloped because of the continuous dominance of the political leaderships form the other parts of the state, especially Western Maharashtra. Traditionally Vidarbha has lagged way behind Western Maharashtra in industrial growth. Various incentives were granted to attract industries but have failed mainly due to an indifferent attitude of the politicians. Butibori Industrial Area MIDC outside Nagpur is one of the largest industrial areas in country but few industries have actually opened there as there were no promotional schemes neither there have been any and tax incentives being granted to attract investments, unlike the Mumbai-Pune-Nasik belt where government has gone head-over-heels to help foreign industries to set up their establishments. Neither has there been encouragement for heavy industries to establish setup in the region apart from few Cement industries in Ballarshah and Chandrapur. The major textile mills in Nagpur and nearby areas have died a slow indifferent death, as they found no patronage from amongst the major industry brands nor the willingness of the political parties, in-spite of Vidarbha being a major cotton producing region.

MIHAN an international cargo hub project is currently underway at Nagpur. The project aims to exploit the central location of Nagpur and convert the present airport into a major freight hub with integrated road and rail connectivity along with a Special Economic Zone. However the project has been plagued by long delays and policies and is progressing at such laggardly pace that the people of Vidarbha and Nagpur in particular who are working in companies and industries in various parts of the country have lost hopes of ever returning to their homeland and settle there. Even the IT industries have shown a marked neglect towards investment in Nagpur as a potential amongst the Tier -2 segment for IT and ITES sector. Apart from the entrepreneurial ventures by Nagpurian’s in form of Lambent Technologies, Infospectrum, etc and few others as Persistent Tech and Premier Tech, there are hardly any names to boast of in terms of Software companies in Nagpur. Although there have been major investments by Satyam, IBM, HCL, TCS in terms of land acquisition in Nagpur, but the intentions and urgency to bring up a likely Developing Center anytime soon has been poor, compared to the cities of Jaipur, Indore, Chandigarh, Cochin, etc which too were marked at the same time as Tier-2 targets and are developing at a very fast pace.

Nagpur is an important city for the scientific community as it is headquarters of number of national level scientific and governmental establishments like the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI), Central Institute of Cotton Research (CICR), National Research Centre for Citrus, National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land Use Planning, and the Jawaharlal Nehru National Aluminium Research and Development Centre. Nagpur is also an important city for the Indian armed forces. The city is the headquarter of Maintenance command of Indian Air Force. The Indian Army's Ordinance factory and staff college are located on west side of city. Nagpur’s suburb Kamptee has cantonment of Regimental center of Indian Army’s Brigade made up of National Cadet Corps’ Officers’ Training School, Institute of Military Law and other establishments. Nagpur’s National Civil defense College provides civil defense and disaster management training to pupils from all over India and abroad. Indian Air Force’s giant IL-76 transport planes nicknamed “Gajraj” are based in Nagpur.

Tourism too has a major industry prospective in Vidarbha which has lush green deciduous forests, home to a variety of flora and fauna. These attract a large number of visitors each year. All of Maharashtra's tiger reserves are located in Vidarbha. They are Melghat Tiger Reserve, Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve and Pench Tiger Reserve. Nagzira wild life sanctuary and Navegoan Bandh National Park (bird sanctuary) are also very popular. The Tadoba is Maharashtra's oldest National Park created in 1955, spanning 575.78 sqkm, one of India's 25 Project Tiger Reserves. The Satpura mountain range in Amravati and its beautiful surroundings in Chikaldhara, the major spots of attraction as Ramtek and Khindsi, Pench Dam, Deeksha Bhumi, Tajbagh, Sitabuldi Fort in Nagpur, Kanhan and Waingangā rivers have seen people crowd these places during holidays and weekends. All in all Tourism can be a major economy in Vidarbha if properly addressed and developed.

The city of Nagpur the largest of Vidarbha has every potential of become a state capital having a special civic body, the Nagpur Improvement Trust, which along with Nagpur Municipal Corporation is responsible for overall development and planning activity. Other significant cities like Amravati and Akola too have their own municipal corporation. Urban areas are split in different wards and each ward elects a representative. Rural areas have a Panchayat raj system. Vidarbha is represented at national level by 10 Lok Sabha seats and 62 assembly seats at state level, which is significant when compared to some of the very small states of India hardly representing 3-4 Lok Sabha and are stretched to make up 40 minimal assembly seats to constitute a State Legislative Assembly. As part of the Nagpur pact the winter session of Maharashtra assembly is held as Nagpur Vidhan Bhavan (although it has become a farce and a mockery of exercise by the ministers and elected members, with the number of days of active session dwindling continuously and without any meaningful outcomes). The city of Nagpur has its own and unique Nagpur Bench of Bombay High Court apart from the District Court to address the issues.

Vidarbha has seen enough of disregard for its right to a separate and respectful identity. It has always been sidelined economically compared to the rest of Maharashtra and has been plagued very much by poverty and malnutrition. People have waited patiently and have seen their trust betrayed by their so called elected leaders. As in case of Telangana, it is now up to the common man, the students and business class to unite and fight for a common cause to realize their dream of a separate state of Vidarbha. “Jai Hind. Jai Vidarbha.”