how telangana grew more

some doubts were raised here on whether the rest of telangana grew as much as hyderabad in the post-reforms period. dr.jayaprakash narayan of loksatta seems to have looked at that question too. in a television chat show he has tried to answer a similar question:

mahesh:I need some clarification on what factor telangana districts are growing much faster than andhra region districts. Can u please ans me?
Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan: I have presented many parameters and the growth in Telangana & rest of AP over 50 years. The facts speak for themselves. If you see the annual growth rates of gross district domestic product of various districts from 1994-95 to 2006-07, the facts are revealing. 1994-95 to 2006-07 - Annual average growth rate. AP: 6.68%.
Nalgonda: 7.38% Khammam: 6.99% Warangal: 7.57% Karimnagar: 7.53% Adilabad: 6.46% Nizamabad: 6.30% Medak: 7.34% Hyderabad: 10.41% Rangareddy: 9.32% Mahabubnagar:8.34%
Rayalaseema: Kurnool: 5.33% Ananthapur: 5.82% Cuddapah: 4.90% Chittoor: 4.73%
coastal AP Nellore: 5.09% Prakasam: 6.80% Guntur: 4.81% Krishna: 7.01% West Godavari: 5.79% East Godavari: 6.46% Visakhapatnam: 9.65% Vizianagaram: 5.81% Srikakulam: 6.58% you can see these trends - these are long term trends aggregate economic growth over 13 years for each district. The facts speak for themselves. [emphasis mine]

as you can see, in gdp terms, eight (of ten) districts of telangana of grew more than the whole of andhra pradesh in the period 1994-95 to 2006-07, while three (of nine) districts in coastal andhra, and no district (of four) in rayalaseema grew more than the whole of andhra pradesh and these figures match, to a great degree, the results of the study mentioned in my previous post. as i said in my previous post, for unbiased observers, it isn't hard to understand why a large number of districts in telangana grew more. most of them were growing from a lower base, and some like nizamabad had gone through this process much earlier and were now slackening, like many districts in coastal andhra. (also, you'd also find a great deal of other information on development in telangana in other fields too in that lok satta page which strengthen the view that telangana is growing more).

the study i had discussed in my previous post didn't look at gdp figures, but on page 8 of the report you'll find an explanation of why the results of their efforts to measure the 'level of economic activity' across regions differ slightly from gdp figures.

that telangana grew more than coastal andhra in the post-reforms period isn't inconsistent, in my view, with the fact that there are pockets of great distress in the region. it is true that cotton farmers have committed suicide in telangana through the nineties, and it is also true that the area under cotton cultivation has also expanded significantly. the number of farmers' suicides in telangana matches similar figures in vidarbha, punjab and other regions. but it is also true that yields per acre of paddy grown in karimnagar and other parts of telangana now equal or exceed yields in west godavari or guntur districts. mass migrations from mahbubnagar are also true, but so is the increasing number of students from telangana scoring well in board exams and highly competitive entrance tests. parts of nalgonda reel from the effects of high levels of fluoride contamination in the water they drink, but it is also true that other parts of nalgonda present a picture of economic vibrancy and prosperity. it is true that more young rural youngsters were killed in fake encounters than in many other 'naxal-affected' regions in the country, but it is also true that a large number of educated youth have also entered such modern professions as the the academia, law, media on the one hand and government, organized public and private sector industry and new age businesses like software on the other, over the last 2-3 decades.

across india, there are large pockets of distress in every village. rural india as a whole, 70% of the population, gets only 30% of the gdp. and even that small share of the pie gets divided very unevenly: probably 60-80% of it goes to 20% of the rural population. usually those with better and bigger landholdings, and of purer castes. so, there are always enough grounds for distress and anger and agitation. everywhere. i consider it a sign of the strength of the creative capacities of the growing middle class of fairly prosperous telanganis that they've managed to convert so successfully the deprivation and pain of the less fortunate majority into a movement designed to serve, solely, their own growing ambitions.

[ there is a large loony fringe among the separatists who dispute these kind of figures. many times even without looking at them. and dr.jayaprakash narayan's source of the data is probably the government of andhra pradesh, so more suspect in the eyes of the separatists'. but as these issues are discussed more, and at less acrimonious fora, i hope for their own sake that they would find other arguments to make their points in the future].