As Telangana’s panchayat polls approach, Congress confronts a critical challenge with the Backward Classes (BC) quota issue. Struggling to balance appeasing BC voters and broader social coalitions, the party’s maneuvering is akin to a political trapeze act, with potential implications for its electoral prospects in the state.
The Congress came to power in Telangana last year with a promise, among others, to do a caste census and enhance reservations for the BCs. No one knows when elections to the gram panchayats will be held in Telangana. All the 12,769 villages in the state continue to be under the special officers’ rule since 2 February, 2024, as elections were not held in time.
The Congress has been saying that the government would hold them soon but it does not seem to have firmed up how it was going to enhance reservations for the Backward Communities (BCs) in the local bodies, particularly for gram panchayats, which was its commitment to the BCs before it went to the Assembly polls in November 2023.
As it is already six months since the village panchayats have come under special officers’ rule, they have become ineligible for the 15th Finance Commission funds released to the Panchayat Raj Institutions (PRIs).
The Congress promise
The Congress came to power in the state in December last year with a promise, among others, to do a caste census and enhance reservations for the BCs.
However, the census work has not yet begun, and even if it begins shortly, it may take a long time to complete.
Even after the completion of the caste census, the government would face the problem of enhancing reservations to the BCs without breaching the 50 percent cap.
The erstwhile BRS government also faced the problem in 2018 when it brought in a new Panchayat Raj Act.
The gram panchayats are already in dire need of funds. The more the delay, the more the sheen the villages lose which the Congress cannot afford.
The issue with funds
Earlier, when the elected bodies were in place, the sarpanches and ward members somehow or the other took care of the minimum services in the villages like keeping the roads clean or repairing the roads that are in urgent need.
In some villages, the sarpanches, afraid of losing face, spent even their personal funds on repairing roads and maintaining sanitation.
They hoped that the government would clear the bills which it did only in fits which led to several of them, ending their lives by suicide.
Now that there are no sarpanches or ward members, citizen services in villages have taken a hit.
The special officers are reportedly whiling away time and there are reports that some of them, who stay far away from the villages, are not very regular in discharging their additional responsibilities.
The villages are now facing the foreboding prospect of losing the central help.
Finance Commission grants
The Fifteenth Finance Commission (2021-22 to 2025-26) allocated ₹7,201 crore to Telangana for the five years of which 60 percent is a tied grant and the remaining 40 percent is an untied grant.
For 2024-25, the Finance Commission made an allocation of ₹1,514 crore of which ₹605.6 is untied (40 percent, basic) grant and ₹908.4 crore is tied grant (60 percent) for Panchayat Raj Institutions (PRIs) which include Gram Panchayats, Mandal Praja Parishads and Zilla Praja Parishads.
A lion’s share of the Finance Commission’s grants (85 percent) goes to gram panchayats. The grants are released in two instalments in June and October, every year.
The basic grants are untied and can be utilised by the Rural Local bodies under the twenty-nine subjects enshrined in the Eleventh Schedule of the Constitution, except for salaries and other establishment costs and as far as tied grants are concerned, 50 percent could be utilised for the basic services of Sanitation and maintenance of ODF status and remaining 50 percent on supply of drinking water, rainwater harvesting and water recycling.
For the state government, the main problem in holding the elections to the panchayats is enhancing BC reservations. No one knows how the Congress government would cross the hurdle of the 50 percent cap on reservations set by the Supreme Court. In 2018, the then BRS government issued an Ordinance, amending the Telangana Panchayat Raj Act, 2018, declaring that the total reservations in Panchayat Raj elections will not exceed 50 percent.
Existing reservations
The original 2018 Panchayati Raj Act had reserved 34 percent of the total number of offices in Gram Panchayats for Backward Classes.
However, total reservations, after accounting for reservations provided to Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs), which are mandated by the constitution, had crossed 50 percent necessitating amendment as the provision of 34 percent would run in conflict with the Supreme Court’s 50 percent cap order.
As per 2011 census, STs have six percent reservation, and SCs, 16 percent. If 34 percent reservation is provided for the BCs, the total reservations would reach 56 percent. The amendment to the Act reduced the BCs’ reservation to 28 from 34 to to remain within the 50 percent cap set by the Supreme Court.
According to sources, since the caste census would take a long and even if it is done faster, the data would not give much freedom to enhance reservations without breaching the 50 percent cap.
The government would likely go in for panchayat elections with the existing arrangement for this time. Anyway, the 2018 Panchayat Raj Act stipulated that the recreation percentage for the BCs need not be changed for two terms. As this would be the second term, the state government could go for the elections under the existing arrangement.
Review meeting by chief minister
At a couple of review meetings held recently, Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy inquired with officials as to how long it would take for them to complete the caste census.
Their reply was reportedly far from satisfactory. They said they would need at least three months for the staff to compile the fresh data. As the panchayats would lose central funds, the government is ready to conduct the election with the existing arrangement.
According to sources in Congress, the government wants to hold the elections once it is through with the implementation of most of its six guarantees.
The guarantee that was the most visible and most impactful is free travel for women by RTC buses which is believed to have made the women like the state government. It hopes that if it completes ₹2 lakh crop loan waiver by the end of August, the Congress will be able to reap a rich harvest of votes.
To root out BRS
The Congress wants to see the last of the BRS in the rural areas by taking care of the interests of the farmers waiting for the enhanced amount of Rythu Bharosa money.
The party hopes that the crop loan waiver has already set the party on the course to win a maximum number of villages. The other welfare measures, free power supply of up to 200 units and subsidised LPG cylinders, would further brighten its prospects.
The lower rung Congress leaders are waiting for the notification for panchayat elections to come through as they want to make the hay while the sun shines.
BC Rajyadhikara Samiti president Dasu Suresh said the Congress will have to do a lot of explaining if it goes to elections for panchayats with the existing arrangement without enhancing reservations for BCs.
“The Congress had promised 42 percent reservations to the BCs but how would be able to do it, beats me. The Supreme Court’s 50 percent cap would come in the way,” he argued.
He said that even the 28 percent reservation provided in the amendment to the Panchayat Raj Act was misleading.
“Of the total 12,769 panchayats, 2634 panchayats are reserved exclusively for the SCs and STs. That leaves about 10,177 villages. And of them, 2,345 seats were reserved for BCs. If you compare the figure with the total of 12,769, the reservation works out to 18 percent and if it is against 10,177, it is about 23 percent. Of this BC quota, four percent (BC-E group) goes to the Muslims anyway. How much are we left with in the end?” he asked. #hydkhabar
About The Author
