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What led to the Hyderabad rampage?

A day after 300-odd Indian army personnel captured and relinquished a piece of land in Hyderabad, it is time to look at what led to the incident.

The one-acre in Medhipatnam, in reality, belonged to the army. The state government was allowed a bazaar there on a temporary basis. The controversy began within a month of its starting. When the Ranga Reddy district authorities took up measures to continue there permanently, army officials became apprehensive.

They asked the district authorities not to put up concrete structures, and, in the end of March, asked them to shift the bazaar. The deadline given was 30 days.

However, the district authorities went ahead constructing permanent stalls and developing other infrastructure.

Meantime, the state government had written to the defence ministry, asking it to allot the land to the civil authorities. In return it offered 20 acres elsewhere for a hospital that the army wanted built.

The correspondence was on Tuesday, May 11. And Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu notified Ranga Reddy District Collector Rani Kumudini that Defence Minister George Fernandes had agreed to the proposal.

However, early Wednesday morning, the army jawans took the matter into their hands.

Naidu, for his part, got in touch with the defence minister soon after. He sought the site restored to the civilian authorities immediately, and expressed anger over the jawans' highhandedness. The incident was unfortunate and "too bad", he said.

Union Minister of State for Urban Affairs and Employment Bandaru Dattatreya also condemned it. Dattatreya accused the army of land-grabbing and the defence ministry of remaining silent spectators.

The rest of the events -- senior army officials apologising to the collector etc -- is, as they say, history.

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