Bifurcation: Real work to begin on April 30

Hyderabad: As Andhra Pradesh is getting ready for the veritable division on June 2, the government machinery, despite being busy in conduct of the General Elections scheduled to be held on April 30 and May 7 in Telangana and Seemandhra regions, is simultaneously working on the nitty-gritty of apportion. In fact, the real process of bifurcation would begin from April 30, the Union Minister Jairam Ramesh said here on Saturday.

The Minister, who held a meeting with the Governor ESL Narsimhan on Saturday in this regard, said that the two States would share between them 26 lakh files that deal with myriad issues pertaining to different departments. All these files have been digitised so that the process of sharing becomes easy, he said. “The two States will share 1.41 lakh agreements valued at Rs 2.85 lakh crore in the respective regions. While Telangana gets 62,000 agreements worth Rs 1.88 lakh crore, the residual Andhra Pradesh gets Rs 97,000 lakh crore worth (75,000) agreements. There will be some common agreements too,” the Minister said.

According to Jairam, Telangana State will have a burden of Rs 500 crore in pension outgo and Rs 700 crore for the residual Andhra Pradesh. There would be 3.4 lakh pensioners in Andhra Pradesh and 2.4 lakh in Telangana. The process of division will be done based on the recommendations and findings of the 21 committees that were set up to bifurcate assets, liabilities, water and employees. These committees will submit their reports on April 30 and from that date the actual process of bifurcation will begin, he said.

Jairam said the Governor Narsimhan had sought certain clarification in regard to the term special responsibilities of Governor in the matters of administration of Hyderabad as the joint capital for both the states. Narasimhan had sought clarifications from the Centre on ‘special responsibilities’ under the Re-organisation Act which says he can use his discretionary powers in matters like law and order and internal security in the ‘common capital area.’ Jairam said the union home ministry would soon define the special responsibility.

Jairam who has been in town for three days held meeting with senior officials heading the various committees set up to go in to the matters related to the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh. The Union Minister said the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) area will be the common capital of the new State of Telangana and residual Andhra Pradesh for a period of 10 years. “The two Governments will share 85,000 square metres of plinth area of office space for the respective Assemblies, Secretariats and government offices,” he said. The Governor will take care of law and order and protection of life. The Telangana government would advise him on these issues but he can take a call on such advice.

He said as regards sharing of building infrastructure in Hyderabad was concerned, a plinth area of about 85000 sqm has been identified and these areas would be shared between the two regions as per the recommendations of the concerned committees. Jairam said that about 80,000 State-level employees (local and district level employees are not to be touched) will be allocated to the two States. The Kamalnathan Committee appointed by the Centre will look into the requests made by the employees on relocating to other state. The two States will share ownership of 119 companies, organisations and enterprises.

The union minister said the Tungabhadra board will soon have representation from Telangana. “The board now has only two members Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. A notification would be issued soon, “he said. Two boards to take care of water in Krishna and Godavari basins will be there but these boards will have to implement the Central tribunal awards. They will have only technical and administrative powers and not any powers to judge on waters. The government also decided to extend the term of Brijesh Kumar panel till July 31, 2014, he added.