Telangana For Telugians

HYDERABAD: In June, when then Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy asked Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) president K.

Chandrasekhar Rao where he would hide after the humiliating electoral defeat, few would have thought that the goal of a separate state would be achieved in just six months.

Through his 11-day fast-unto-death supported by mass protests, the 55-year-old achieved what other leaders from the region could not in five decades.

For the TRS chief, who called off his fast late Wednesday and broke down while paying tributes to those who laid down their lives for the formation of Telangana, the sudden demise of Rajasekhara Reddy in a helicopter crash in September removed the biggest hurdle in achieving his goal.

YSR, as Rajasekhara Reddy was popularly known, was belligerent in his attacks on Rao. With his iron-like grip over the government and Congress and the kind of rapport he had with the central leadership, he never allowed Rao to dominate.

In October, when the Supreme Court declared Hyderabad a free zone in matters of recruitment to police department, KCR, as the TRS chief is known among his supporters, saw it as a golden opportunity to strike.

The death of YSR and the court order provided much needed oxygen to TRS reeling under the rout in March-April elections.

The TRS founder gave the slogan of "Telangana waley jago, Andhra waley bhago ((Arise people of Telangana, run away people of Andhra)". A frail-looking KCR has always been a crowd puller. Known for his acerbic criticism of his rivals with a mixture of Telugu and Urdu words, he attracted a huge crowd at the public meeting at Siddipet on
Oct 21, where he threatened civil war for achieving separate state.

It was in 2001 that KCR quit as deputy speaker of the assembly and resigned from the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) to float the TRS. The former minister hailing from Medak district revived the decades old movement, which has almost died after the violent agitation of 1969.