The Revanth Reddy government has received flak from the BRS and the BJP for tweaking the design of Telangana Thalli, or the mother of Telangana, with the move labelled an attack on the state’s cultural identity.
The earlier statue (left) had a crown and held maize in one hand, with a Bathukamma pot on the other. The new statue (right) does not have a crown and the Bathukamma pot too has been done away with, giving way to an open palm. (Photo: X/ @amitmalviya)
Tempers are on the rise again in Telangana politics as the A Revanth Reddy-led Congress government prepares to unveil the newly designed statue of “Telangana Thalli (mother of Telangana)” at the state secretariat on Monday, even as a Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) worker has moved the Telangana High Court against its installation.
The event on Monday will coincide with the birthday of former Congress president Sonia Gandhi, whom Reddy has often referred to as the “mother of Telangana”.
The new design has not gone down well with the BRS and the BJP, which have accused the Congress of insulting the identity of the people of Telangana. The BJP has also accused the Congress of placing the “abhayahastham (Congress hand symbol)” in the statue, while replacing details related to the state.
Who is ‘Telangana Thalli’ and what is her importance?
A symbolic figure for the people of Telangana, the statue was first designed by B Venkataramana, a resident of Nirmal district, and installed at the BRS (then the TRS) headquarters in Hyderabad in 2003.
Venkataramana claimed he drew inspiration from the statehood agitation led by former Telangana CM K Chandrashekar Rao, popularly known as KCR. The BRS chief felicitated him in 2015, a year after the state of Telangana was formed.
The Telangana Thalli was an important part of the statehood agitation and was compared to the Telugu Thalli, also known as “Andhra Mata”. During the agitation, the pictures of Telangana Thalli adorned almost all protest groups and the Goddess was often cited to drill home the point of statehood.
How is the new statue different?
The statue earlier had a crown and held maize in one hand, reflecting the prosperity of the region. On her other hand was a Bathukamma pot, the cultural symbol of Telangana’s biggest festival.
The Telangana Thalli was dressed in a pink silk saree meant to represent the famous silks of Gadwal and Pochampalli while the toe rings, symbolic of married women, signified the filigree ornaments of Karimnagar. She wore a gold waistband.
The new statue does not have a crown and the Bathukamma pot too has been done away with, giving way to an open palm. The colour of the saree has been changed to green. The waistband has also been omitted from the new design.
What are the Opposition’s objections?
The BRS targeted the Congress over the design changes, alleging that Reddy was “in a hurry to erase KCR’s legacy” and the new statue was an “insult to Telangana’s identity”.
KCR’s son and former state minister K T Rama Rao hit out at the Congress on Thursday and said his party, on returning to power, would bring down the statue of Rajiv Gandhi installed at the state secretariat in September and replace it with the original one of “Telangana Thalli”.
“The Telangana Thalli statue is a symbol of our identity, created through consensus among Telanganites from all sections during the Telangana movement. To assert our identity, thousands of Telangana Thalli statues were installed during the peak of the statehood movement. With Bathukamma in one hand and a maize/jowar cob in the other, the current Telangana Thalli statue, includes all elements that are truly Telangana. Why does Revanth want our Telangana Thalli to look poor without a crown? Why would anyone in their right mind want their symbol of identity to look poor?” the BRS said in a post on X on Friday.
The BJP too slammed the Congress government for changing the colour of the saree and called the move “an attack on the state’s cultural identity”. “As the Congress government in Telangana marks its first anniversary, here is a striking example of an attack on the state’s cultural identity. The @revanth_anumula led Congress government has altered the depiction of Telangana Thalli, the revered Goddess of Telangana, changed the saree color to green, removed the Bathukamma, removed the crown and jewellery while adding the Abhaya Hastam (symbolizing the Congress logo). Let us not forget that CM Revanth Reddy once called Sonia Gandhi the ‘Mother of Telangana’. This is deeply shameful,” BJP IT Cell chief Amit Malviya wrote on X on Saturday.
Has the Congress said anything?
A senior state Congress leader said the move was just an extension of the “changing spree” that the government has been on since assuming power last December and expressed concern that it may blow back on the party.
“First, they changed the emblem, logo and names of schemes. Now it is the statue. This will not bode well with the people, who have not yet forgotten the dilly-dallying of the Congress during the statehood agitation. The Congress can ill afford to forget that it was wiped out from Telangana after the state was formed. It has taken 10 years for us to come back to power and we should not let this slip from our hands,” the Congress functionary said on the condition of anonymity.
Is this the first such row over a statue?
No, the BRS and the Congress locked horns in September after the Rajiv Gandhi statue, which KTR has threatened to remove, was unveiled. KTR had claimed that the space where the Rajiv statue was installed was originally meant for the Telangana Thalli statue.
Reddy, at the unveiling, lashed out at the BRS, and claimed its leaders were resorting to cheap politics. “These BRS leaders, who are playing cheap politics in the name of Telangana, had looted thousands of crores in the last 10 years of their regime. They have no idea about the sacrifices made by the Gandhi family. I want to remind them that it was the Nehru family which sacrificed its wealth for the country and fought for the freedom of the country,” the CM had said.