Issue of reservation has left the tribals in Telangana vertically divided badly hitting the efforts of ruling Telangana Rashtra Samiti to consolidate its hold on its support base.
The issue of including Lambadas in the list of tribals has left the other groups of tribals including aboriginal Adivasis angry and alienated from the ruling party.
TRS leading including the tribal legislators were worried with both the sides flexing their muscles and organising their shows of strength. Gonds, mostly concentrated in the undivided Adilabad district were in the forefront of the campaign demanding the removal of Lambadas from the list of scheduled tribes.
Gonds and other Adviasis have organised meetings expressing their anger over Lambadas cornering most of the benefits of the reservations in education and the jobs and were demanding that injustice should be undone.
The genesis of the issue lies goes back to 1976 when the then Tribal Affairs Minister K Bheem Rao had given his consent to the inclusion of Lambadas in the list of STs and the same was continuing till now.
Presently Bheem Rao’s daughter K Lakshmi is a TRS legislator from the area and she was facing the heat from the Gond tribals.
While the TRS Government tried to placate the simmering discontent among the Gonds by naming Asifabad district after Kumaram Bheem, a Gond leader who had waged a struggle against the Nizam Government and also set up a tribal museum. But the Gonds were not satisfied. “This will not end our property. We want education and jobs”, said a Gond leader.