Telangana fall-out: Who is running Andhra now?

Now that Lok Sabha has passed and Rajya Sabha concurred on conceding the demand for Telangana, who is running Andhra Pradesh now? Nobody probably knows. At least till noon today, two days after Kiran Kumar Reddy resigned as the chief minister of the state. Reddy has not been asked to remain in office till alternative arrangements are made, or, stay on as a caretaker chief minister. In fact, making alternative arrangements is not going to be easy. Perhaps the Congress, at this point of time, may not even be able to say how many of the MLAs are from its party now, though they were elected on its tickets. In fact, the governor, ESL Narasimhan, it is reported, has just about sent a report to the central Home Ministry about Reddy’s resignation. [caption id=“attachment_1402131” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Kiran Kumar Reddy. AFP.[/caption] Reddy will not return to the job. Anyone else who has aspirations of taking the chair, will not find slipping into the new role easy. In fact, anyone who takes over right now will have nothing to do but engage in political mud-wrestling. When a chief minister quits, it amounts to the resignation of the entire cabinet. Then who is running Andhra Pradesh now? Several of the MLAs, who were in charge of ministries, have either quit Congress or has resigned from the cabinet. Add to it the fact that a council of ministers cannot function without a chief minister leading them. Political loyalties have been in a state of flux ever since the formation of Telangana was announced. There seems to be no MLAs and MPs divided along party lines - they are divided according to which part of the bifurcated Andhra Pradesh they belong to. They are not Congress or BJP MLAs, they are now Telanagana and Seemandhra MLAs. Kiran Kumar Reddy was never unclear about his resignation. According to reports, he also cleared his desks and drawers of his office out a couple of days before he quit. But some others, to hang on to their existing privileges, have reportedly not given up being ‘ministers’ yet, despite having quit. This also possibly stems from the fact that their resignations have not been accepted yet by the Raj Bhavan. That implies that, while public attention shifted to Delhi during the passage of the Bill to confer statehood for Telangana, things have been allowed to drift dangerously into another phase of confusion in Andhra Pradesh. But the moot point is, whether, Andhra Pradesh government has functioned at all since the announcement of formation of Telangana. Except during the cyclone, which was handled well, the government has been in a state of being suspended. The Telangana employees and the Seemandhra employees had even decided on separate entrances to the secretariat, had held demonstrations. Without a chief minister to advise him, the governor is a lame duck. Perhaps, a President’s Rule is in the offing, anytime. But a back-up plan has not been planned and prepared.