Is the Telangana lawyers strike putting Hyderabad at risk?

Is the strike by Telangana lawyers putting Hyderabad, which is on the terror radar of the Islamic State, at risk?


Senior police officers are reluctant to say security of the city has been compromised as a result of too many men in uniform deployed only at different courts in Hyderabad. ``Let me put it this way. We are unable to focus on security of the city,'' said a senior police officer on the condition of anonymity.

The strike by Telangana lawyers, which started on June 6, is stretching the Hyderabad police force. Roughly 3000 of the city's 14000-strong police force is currently deployed only at different courts to provide security. For the past week, since the agitation intensified with calls for 'Chalo High Court', every day, three DCPs - from South, East and West zones - and their forces are deployed at the High court of Hyderabad, the only court in Telangana that is functioning.

The DCP of Central Zone and roughly 400 policemen spend the entire day at the Nampally court.

In some zones in Hyderabad city, roughly 50 per cent of the force has been deployed at court complexes. Another 30 per cent men and women are kept on standby to tackle any eventuality. Already, for the last one week, shifts have been reduced from three to two, which means the cops are working 12 hours instead of eight.

Even though this means that many parts of Hyderabad have been left unguarded, the police wants to ensure the agitation by the judicial officers does not go out of hand. Any untoward incident, they fear, will invite a rap on the knuckles by the High Court.

``The law and order situation in my jurisdiction is messed up,'' another senior officer admitted. ``My men cannot act tough with the lawyers. We have to be alert all the time because even one attack on a lawyer of Andhra nativity can make things spiral out of control, given the sensitivities involved.''

The Telangana judicial officers are upset at how even two years after bifurcation, the High court of Hyderabad has not been divided into one each for the two Telugu states of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.


On May 5, the High Court allocated judges in both states and of the 102 district judges posted in Telangana, 72 turned out to be of Andhra nativity and only 30 from Telangana. The Telangana judges say this would compromise their chances of getting promotions.

Telangana lawyers, however, say the state needs to trust them. ``We are agitating in a peaceful manner. Nothing will go out of hand,'' assured T Srinivas, a Telangana advocate, who is part of the agitation.

With no work taking place in all courts in Telangana, barring the High court, for the last 25 days, petitioners are a harassed lot. This has even impacted the terror case in which five operatives of a suspected Islamic


State terror module were arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Wednesday. K Ravinder Reddy, the NIA court judge is among those suspended by the High court for leading the agitation and the case was heard by another judge. 


What is worrying the police is that if the agitation, which is now backed by political parties including the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samiti, is not called off by the weekend, its manpower will be really stretched next week.


On July 5, the Jagannath Yatra will see more than 2000 people in attendance. Eid is likely to fall on July 6 and adequate security has to be provided at all mosques. In the light of the busting of the terror module, the city police is on tenterhooks, with its intelligence wing tracking known anti-social elements.


From July 10, the Bonalu festival, a traditional Telangana festival during the monsoon will start. The exhausted force has no men or women to spare for their security at various temples.

This weekend is also going to be tense, with rumours floating on social media about an impending terror strike in Hyderabad on Saturday evening. Though the city police commissioner Mahender Reddy himself has clarified that there is no truth to the rumour, the arrest of the five men has only injected a sense of nervousness in the citizens.