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Tejasvi Surya faces flak over AP bifurcation remarks in Parl
BJP MP Tejasvi Surya likened the bifurcation of erstwhile Andhra Pradesh into two states to a situation “much worse than the partition of India”
Bharatiya Janata Party MP Tejasvi Surya on Thursday likened the bifurcation of erstwhile Andhra Pradesh into two states to a situation “much worse than the partition of India,” which triggered an uproar in Telangana. Speaking during Parliament’s special session on the delimitation bill, the BJP MP said the formation of Telangana was done in a “worse fashion” than the British during India’s partition.
Tejasvi was opposing a “hybrid model” proposed by Telangana chief minister A Revanth Reddy on delimitation and the expansion of Lok Sabha seats. Arguing that the proposal violated the principle of “one person, one vote, one value”, Tejasvi criticised the Congress for “politics of postponement.”
“The Congress-led UPA government divided the undivided Andhra Pradesh into AP and Telangana. The partition of AP and Telangana was done in a worse fashion than the British did during the partition of India and Pakistan. This is the kind of legacy that they have,” Surya said.
Following the remarks, both the Congress and the Bharat Rashtra Samithi reacted sharply and demanded that the BJP MP be disqualified for insulting the Parliament which had passed the legislation to form Telangana state.
Telangana backward classes minister Ponnam Prabhakar told reporters that Surya’s remarks were detrimental to democratic values. He demanded that the comments be expunged from the Lok Sabha records and went a step further to call for the cancellation of Surya’s membership in the House.
In a letter to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla, Prabhakar said that the analogy of India’s partition with bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh was not only factually untenable but also deeply insensitive and inappropriate in the context of parliamentary discourse.
“The formation of Telangana was the outcome of a democratic and constitutional process, reflecting the legitimate aspirations of its people. Equating this with the traumatic and violent partition of the nation diminishes the sanctity of that process and disregards the sentiments of the people of Telangana,” he said and demanded that the MP tender an unconditional apology to the House and to the people of Telangana.
Senior BRS leader and former minister T Harish Rao also lashed out at Surya, demanding an apology for comparing the formation of Telangana with the partition of India and Pakistan. He described the remarks as an insult to the people of Telangana made in Parliament.
Rao questioned the BJP’s stance, asking why the party had supported the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh if it viewed the process as akin to the India-Pakistan partition. He emphasised that the creation of Telangana was the result of decades of struggle and sacrifices by students, youth, employees and the public.
BJP state president N Ramachander Rao, however, brushed aside the allegations and said the BRS and the Congress were needlessly twisting and misrepresenting the remarks made by Tejaswi Surya.
“The MP’s remarks must be understood in the proper context in which they were made. Surya was only commenting on the way the Congress had handled the Andhra Pradesh bifurcation issue, compared to the formation of Uttarakhand, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh during the Vajpayee regime in a peaceful manner,” Rao said.
He said Telangana was formed because of the sustained support extended by the BJP. “These are facts that Congress cannot deny, distort, or run away from. It also exposed that BRS and Congress are one,” the state BJP chief said.
