Telangana Elections 2023: Failure to create adequate jobs troubles KCR

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From grazing buffaloes in the fields to the legislative assembly – the road the young Dalit is aspiring to tread on with all the audacity of youth through the dicey battle of ballots, hasn’t fazed her one bit despite all the attendant risks and challenges. Meet 26-year old Karne Sirisha, popularly known as Barrelakka or sister of buffaloes, a trailblazer who has set out on the most uncertain and unpredictable of journeys.

Sirisha is a one-woman army in the poll battle in Telangana’s Kollapur, but she was quick to draw attention from many quarters. She shot to limelight as a whistle-blower, exposing the failure of Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao or KCR in addressing the distress among unemployed youth through social media. Shirisha has aptly got the whistle as her election symbol.

Unemployment Gets Poll Traction

Struck by the tale of Barrelakka venturing into the election arena despite a marginalised background, a former minister hailing from Puducherry’s Yanam which is surrounded by Andhra Pradesh on all sides – Malladi Krishna Rao – donated Rs 1 lakh towards her election expenses. A Hyderabad-based Youtuber CL Venkata Rao offered Rs 10,000. Donations are reportedly pouring in even from foreign countries.

As an independent candidate with no money and muscle power on her side, the young girl is poised to take on two mighty former leaders – Jupalli Krishna Rao from the Congress and Beeram Harshavardhan Reddy from the ruling BRS. Rao, who has dominated the constituency for decades, had defected to the TRS in 2014 and returned to Congress after Reddy – elected on a Congress ticket in 2018 – defected to TRS (now BRS).

On the strength to meet such a daunting task and become a giant killer, the young candidate says Chakali Ilamma, a legendary figure in Telangana’s armed conflict against Nizam’s rule, is her inspiration.

Abandoned by her alcoholic father and growing up under the care of her mother, a victim of wife-beating and domestic violence, Sirisha has become a social media influencer. One of her videos posted on Instagram showing how she turned into Barrelakka (sister of buffaloes) after her dream of getting a job came crashing down despite her B.Ed. qualifications, incurred the wrath of the powers-that-be in the KCR government.

The rest as they say is history. Police slapped a case against Sirisha and arrested her on a charge of “defaming” the government. Soon, she became a social media star with her followers dramatically shooting up, which now number in lakhs across multiple platforms.

Will Jobless Growth Sting KCR?

Now she is a recognised voice for around lakhs of jobless youths in Telangana. There are claims that Telangana has 40 lakh unemployed youth, a figure that Congress leaders have been repeatedly citing. BJP leaders have also been claiming similar joblessness numbers. Distress among unemployed youths with no prospects of filling a large number of job vacancies in the state government, meanwhile, have resulted in a spate of suicides with both young men and women being among the victims.

According to the latest Periodic Labour Force Survey, Telangana’s unemployment rates among young people in the 15-29 age group and people who have completed post-graduation are higher than the national average, signalling that KCR’s promises on addressing the unemployment problem have been broken.

Niyamakalu (jobs), was one of the triple promises of KCR with which he popularised the statehood movement by mobilising students and youths in large numbers. A common mobilising cry of the statehood movement was that people from the Andhra region were taking away all the jobs. Now that slogan is also not available.

The government job vacancies before the state formation were estimated to be around 2.25 lakh and the government during KCR’s first term claimed to have filled around 1.32 lakh vacancies, mostly from the police department. However, several leaks of question papers have led to suspension of the recruitment processes under the TSPSC (Telangana State Public Service Commission), which is tasked with filling job vacancies in government under Group-I, II, III and IV categories.

The state’s per capita income in FY 2023 at Rs 3.12 lakh is considerably on the higher side – much higher than even neighbouring Andhra Pradesh by nearly Rs 1 lakh. But this figure only serves to expose the income inequality gaps in KCR’s development paradigm – and unemployed youth are becoming the biggest symbol of the lopsided progress the state has achieved.

Back to the spirited tale of Barrelakka; An alleged attack on her and her brother while out campaigning a few days back, in an attempt to threaten her to back out from the fray, has shaken the conscience of civil society. VV Lakshminarayana, CBI former Joint Director, tweeted on X, requesting the Telangana’s Director General of Police and Chief Election Commissioner of India, state Chief Electoral Officer to give protection to Sirisha and her family members. Offers for cover her legal expenses have also poured in, even from abroad.

Election in a Telangana assembly constituency could mean an unofficial expenditure ranging anything between Rs 30 crore to even 100 crore, which is obviously out of reach for commoners like her. Win or lose, Sirisha certainly has succeeded in triggering public outrage. The attack on her has highlighted the degeneration of values in the modern polity and the groundswell in her favour is an evidence for this.

Gali Nagaraja is a senior journalist, formerly associated with The Hindu, The Times of India, and Hindustan Times for over three decades. Views are personal, and do not represent the stand of this publication.