MAHBUBNAGAR: Standing in the shade of the Pillalamarri, Raman Singh draws a metaphor from Mahbubnagar’s famed ancient banyan tree to describe the byelection scheduled here on March 18. “See this tree?” asks the man, who works as a chowkidar.“No one knows where the original trunk of the tree is.This election is like that.No one knows what the main issue is.Do people want Telangana? Or do they want drinking water? No one knows.” Mahbubnagar is getting warmed up for yet another byelection in Telangana.But there’s been a slight change in the air.Ever since the Sakala Janula Samme crumbled back in September, there has been a listlessness among the votaries of separate statehood for Telangana.Now they sit under the Pillalamarri, and ask, “Will it ever come?” The listlessness is evident even in the conversations on the bus to Mahbubnagar, full of commuters returning from a day at work in Hyderabad.Where there used to be discussions about the coming of the dream, people look out of the window at the landscape when the question comes up.In town, signs of disarray are all around.There’s uncleared garbage all around the bus terminus, and the roads are scuffed.The municipal council has done its term and the municipality attends to day-to-day work desultorily.No staff.The public taps are dry, and water is supplied by tanker once in about 10 days.The bore wells have sunk deeper, and the trickle is contaminated.Power cuts, in town and in the countryside around, are an everyday occurrence.The district used to be the migration capital of the state, and continues to be so.The migration never stopped, what with a labour couple getting to earn `1,000 per day up north compared to the `200 daily wage ruling here.And now the drought has returned.The groundnut patches have withered and died.No one waits for a public bus any more.Some 10,000 autos and 2,000 seven-seaters ply on the roads from villages to town and are the bigest source of jobs in this district.But in these very conditions, Mahbubnagar had been a very different place in the months before the Sakala Janula Samme.The government was down on the ropes and villagers spoke nonchalantly about their MLAs.“They dare not come here,” they used to say.And amid the drought and the power cuts and the water shortage and migration, there was dreamy talk of the coming of Telangana, when all would be well.Now the drought hurts.Standing at the Clock Tower Cirlce in the heart of Mahbubnagar, young S Ramulu says, “It’a bit like that clock tower.Time passes, and maybe Telangana will come.But we need drinking water and sanitation now.Who’ll get it to us?” The Telangana sentiment is now an aching, yearning rather than a burning desire.But it is something, not something that has been.Says teacher V Naga Mani of Boothpur mandal, “We don’t discuss Telangana as if it is coming tomorrow any more.But we all believe that it’s been delayed only because of our leaders’ indifference.” Sometimes the anger turns to K Chandrasekhar Rao.To V Lakshmi, a housewife of Mahabubnagar, he was unequal to the hope vested in him.“In earlier elections we thought we should choose a leader who could portray our problems at the national level.But Chandrashekar Rao has only been a visitor to Mahbubnagar.He did organise two or three agitations, and said all our problems will vanish when Telangana is realised.But we have lives to live.My family used to spend `100 to buy vegetables for a week.Now we have to spend `400.We have to bear that too while we wait for Telangana.” The state of things lends itself to wry humour characteristic of Telangana.Rajender Reddy, the chairman of the local chapter of the Employees Telangana JAC, pithily describes the Sakala Janula Samme as ‘operation success but patient died’: “All our agitations have been a success but we have not been able to achieve Telangana.How could we? There is no coordination in the movement any more.The TRS didn’t even discuss its candidate for this byelection with the TJAC.” You hear a lot of voices in Mahbubnagar that this byelection is not about Telangana, and that its outcome cannot be seen as a straw in the wind, pointing to a lingering presence, or lack thereof, of the Sentiment.Says Gattu Buchanna of Chandarpally village on the outskirts of town, “This election is being held because our MLA died.People will vote based on local factors and not because of the Telangana sentiment.But then, in terms of the intensity of Telangana fervour, Mahbubnagar has never been the hotbed of the separate state agitation.It is very proximate (110 km) to Hyderabad.A vast number of the people of this town work in the capital.So if the bypolls does not go to the TRS, it proves nothing about the movement at large.Other Parties* The BJP will field former TRS district president NM Srinivasa Reddy for the seat.Srinivas Reddy, who came out of the party in 2009 due to differences with TRS chief K Chandrasekhara Rao, might wean away most of the Hindu TRS votes in favour of his new party.* YSR Congress is staying out of the contest here, yet there are many admirers of Y S Rajasekhara Reddy here.These votes are expected to go to the TRS as a strategic move.EC Issues Bypoll Notificat ionHyderabad: The Election Commission on Wednesday issued notification for byelections at seven Assembly segments in the state.The last date for filing of nominations is February 29 and scrutiny will take place on March 1.The last date for withdrawal of nominations is March 3 and polling will be held on March 18 from 8 am to 5 pm.Counting will take place on March 21 and results will be declared the same day.
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