Protesters took to the streets, setting buses on fire and clashing with police, in anger over India’s decision to carve a new state out of the southern region of Andhra Pradesh.
The conflict highlighted the tensions that underlie the vast array of ethnic and linguistic groups bound together in the massive Indian country.
The country has allayed some of that friction by giving substantial power to its 28 states and creating new states to empower still more ethnic minorities.
PHOTO: EPA
In a surprise move, the federal government agreed on Wednesday to give in to an 11-day hunger strike by a senior politician, K. Chandrasekhara Rao, who demanded the creation of the new state of Telangana out of the vast state of Andhra Pradesh.
As Rao’s condition weakened, his supporters stepped up protests and threatened to storm the state legislature.
Telangana supporters have complained their area in the north of the state was underdeveloped and ignored by powerful politicians from southern Andhra Pradesh. Demands for a separate state have erupted sporadically since the 1950s.
The government’s decision to create a new state led to counter protests. A mob rampaged on Friday through the streets of Hyderabad, the capital of Andhra Pradesh, in anger over the government’s decision. Under the proposal, Hyderabad would be located deep inside Telangana, though it was not clear whether it would be part of the new state, the old state, or serve as a joint capital.
The crowd lit a bus ablaze and threw rocks at vehicles, while police tried to disperse them with batons.
The decision also stirred anger within the ruling Congress Party, with more than 130 Andhra Pradesh legislators resigning from the party to oppose the division of one of India’s largest states.
Already, the government appeared to be backtracking. Andhra Pradesh chief minister K. Rosaiah said the government would move ahead with the decision only if a broad consensus was evident among the people of the state.
The government’s initial decision has given hope to ethnic minority groups across India who have been pushing for states of their own for decades, including in the remote northeast, where long simmering separatist demands often boil over into violence.
“If Andhra Pradesh can be divided to create a new state, why not Assam? Our demand for a separate Bodoland state for the Bodo ethnic group is more than two decades old,” Hagrama Mohilary, chief of the autonomous Bodoland Territorial Council, said on Friday.
Meanwhile, critics said the government did not properly study the ramifications before announcing its decision on Telangana.
“The decision was taken in immense haste. It wasn’t thought through. The party’s own legislators are rebelling against this,” said Pratap Bhanu Mehta, political analyst and head of the Center for Policy Research in New Delhi.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of
IN PURSUIT: Israel’s defense minister said the revenge attacks by Israeli settlers would make it difficult for security forces to find those responsible for the 14-year-old’s death Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday condemned the “heinous murder” of an Israeli teenager in the occupied West Bank as attacks on Palestinian villages intensified following news of his death. After Benjamin Achimeir, 14, was reported missing near Ramallah on Friday, hundreds of Jewish settlers backed by Israeli forces raided nearby Palestinian villages, torching vehicles and homes, leaving at least one villager dead and dozens wounded. The attacks escalated in several villages on Saturday after Achimeir’s body was found near the Malachi Hashalom outpost. Agence France-Presse correspondents saw smoke rising from burned houses and fields. Mayor Amin Abu Alyah, of the