On the Eve of Its Birth, War Lines Drawn in Telangana?

Hyderabad: Inside what is being called a "war room" on the ground floor of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi headquarters in Hyderabad, a team is swiftly sifting through names of government employees to identify those from Seemandhra who work in what will be Telangana, India's 29th state, in a few hours from now. (Read: Telangana to be a Reality Tomorrow)

Government employees have been asked to leak information, complain about colleagues and provide evidence to show why some of them should not be allowed to work for the new government headed by TRS chief KCR (K Chandrasekhar Rao).

In the TRS war room, the team collating data tags names as "Telangana Employee" or "Seemandhra Employee".

Srinivas Goud, a union leader who has been elected MLA, explains, "War Room doesn't mean it is a war. It means on war footing, we want to collect data so that the government can take action. The government as of now has no information because it was 'their' government and even IAS officers were partial."

At stake, the TRS claims, are thousands of jobs that have been wrongly taken by those from outside Telangana. They say the number could be as much as a lakh. Seemandhra employees who work here say the figure is much smaller.

The Seemandhra regions will form the residual Andhra Pradesh state when the state is bifurcated tomorrow. People from there have been bitterly opposed to the bifurcation and the demand for Telangana has vertically divided employees in the state secretariat in Hyderabad. (Also Read: Centre Promises Full Support to Chandrababu Naidu's Seemandhra Wish List)

The tension continues with KCR declaring that he will not allow Seemandhra employees to work for his government. They won't be allowed to cross the gate of the secretariat, he had warned, even if they are allotted to Telangana.

On Saturday night, nearly 10,000 employees got "orders to serve" the Telangana government, on a temporary basis for three months, before a final call is taken. (Read: Seemandhra Employees Cannot Work in Telangana, Says K Chandrasekhar Rao)

"If there are false documents, the employee can always be suspended. They are trying to create a fear psychosis so that those from Seemandhra will voluntarily say we want to go from here," said Chinnikrishna, an employee at the Secretariat who belongs to Seemandhra.