SC rejects plea on ’56 T-agreement

The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a public interest litigation that sought enforcing of the ’Gentlemen’s Agreement’ signed by leaders of all political parties from Telangana and Andhra regions in 1956 for creating Andhra Pradesh to help in curbing the demand for a separate state.

“We can’t entertain such a petition,” said a bench comprising Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan and Justice Deepak Verma, while dismissing the PIL filed by Mr M. Narasimha Swamy after a brief hearing.

Mr Swamy had pleaded for issuing notice to the AP government and the Centre for enforcing the 1956 accord.

The petitioner accused the successive governments of “discriminating” against the poor people of Telangana in terms of the government employment, education and allocation of funds. He described it as the main reason for the demand for a separate state. If the accord was implemented in letter and spirit the issue would have not surfaced, the PIL said.

“The violations of the agreement are cited as one of the reasons for demands for separate statehood for Telangana,” the PIL said while citing 14 demands on behalf of the people of Telangana, which were not met as per the 1956 agreement.

Among the points raised by the PIL were inadequate funds for local self-government, public health, education, particularly primary and secondary education, irrigation, drinking water schemes, development of agriculture, market for the agro- products, cooperatives and overall planned development of entire Telangana region.

“The agreement reached by representatives of all parties assuring measures for Telangana region could not be implemented, nor any machinery created for the same,” though the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had announced an eight-point programme in the Lok Sabha in 1969 and 5-point plan in 1972 for implementing the accord.

“The fate of these measures received the same treatment as the similar measures taken earlier. Instead a six-point plan was presented in Parliament in 1973, further reducing the protection and safeguards for people of Telangana and it mostly benefited people of Andhra region,” the PIL said,