Caught in a helpless situation following a political war between Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, E.S.L. Narasimhan, the common Governor of both the States is playing the unenviable role of a referee against all odds.
Highly placed sources maintained that the Governor has tried his best to defuse the situation from getting out of hands after TDP MLA A. Revanth Reddy was arrested, allegedly trying to bribe nominated MLA Elvis Stephenson to support his party candidate in the recent Legislative Council election.
If authoritative sources are to be believed, but for the intervention of the Governor, the Telangana Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) would have gone ahead and served notice on the AP Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu and others on Wednesday itself. At the meeting between him and the Telangana Chief Minister K.Chandrasekhar Rao, the issue cropped up and it was at the instance of the former that the move was dropped for the time being.
It is learnt that Mr. Rao had informed the Goverrnor that the ACB sleuths were ready to serve a notice on Mr. Naidu and others as they have ‘clinching evidence’ to nail them. Mr. Narasimhan is believed to have counselled Mr. Rao against taking such step as the issue could snowball into a huge row between the two States.
He is also understood to have taken the initiative to see that the TDP MLC candidate in the recent Legislative Council election Vem Narender Reddy was let off after questioning. Sources pointed out that but for that action, Mr. Narender Reddy would have been taken into custody.
Centre’s role
The task of the Governor, sources said, was cut out as the Centre reportedly wanted him to see that two States stop sparring over the bribery issue and also the alleged audio tapes leak involving the AP Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu and the nominated MLA. While the AP Government began to target him, the Telangana Government updated him on all developments.
Sources said Centre did not want the tensions between the two governments get out of control which could lead to an unprecedented Constitutional crisis and hence repeatedly been advising the Governor to take the initiative and thrash out the differences. His job has turned delicate after he was targeted by the TDP in the last few days.
Over a year ago when Andhra Pradesh was bifurcated into the states of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh and he took charge of both the states as Governor, Mr. Narasimhan would not have imagined even in his wildest dreams that he would be caught in the political war between governments of K. Chandrashekar Rao and N. Chandrababu Naidu.
Ever since the cash-for-vote controversy broke out in the last week of May, the Governor has been at the receiving end of a virulent attack from the top echelons of the TDP on the ground that he has become a silent spectator to the alleged brazen illegal acts of Telanagana government targeting its functionaries. Their case is that Governor should have acted on their charges of phone tapping by the Telangana government. However, the AP government has not come publicly with any evident to substantiate the allegations.
Test case
The extraordinary provision in the AP Re-organisation Act, which vests the Governor with law and order powers in the joint capital of Hyderabad to safeguard the “liberty and security” of citizens from other regions residing in the city, renders the constitutional authority vulnerable to attack of bias by either or both of the States. The political war between the two States has become the first test case to the unique experiment of a common Governor with the responsibility to safeguard interests of all citizens in Hyderabad.
