August 23, 2016 is 144th birth anniversary of Prakasam Panthulu. Noted scholar from Kurnool, Kuradi Chandrasekhara Kalkura pays tributes to Andhra Kesari, who gave exemplary governance to the people of Andhra state during 1953-54 for 13 months from Kurnool, the then capital of Andhra state.
Tanguturi Prakasam (23 August 1872 – 20 May 1957) was born to Subbamma and Gopala Krishnayya, in the village of Vinodarayunipalem, 26 km from Ongole, now in Prakasam District. Having lost his father at the age of 11, Prakasam was brought up by his mother; a mess owner at Ongole. (Pootakullamma). With the help of his mother and the mentor Immaneni Hanumantharao Naidu, Prakasam started his career as a pleader in Rajahmundry. Engaged himself in the local social activities, he rose to become the Chairman of Rajahmundry Municipal Council in 1903. With his own efforts and earning, he became a Barrister and settled in Madras. His success as a front ranking Barrister, with fame and name and wealth was meteoric. Influenced by Bipin Chandra Pal, whose speeches he used to translate into Telugu at Madras, with patriotic fervour, he attended the Surat session of the Indian National Congress in 1907 and he did not miss, even one till he parted company with the Congress in 1950.
In 1937 as the Revenue Minister in Rajaji’s Cabinet in Composite Madras State, he brought out revolutionary changes in Revenue Administration; most important among them is the creation of dividing Taluks into Firkas for administrative convenience. In April, 1946 he became the Chief Minister of the Madras State. During his tenure as Chief ministership, Prakasam publicly declared his intention to scrap all existing textile industries in the province and replace them with Khadi manufacturing and weaving units. Opposing the move, in February 1947, Communists broke into a full-scale revolt. On Vallabhai Patel’s advice, Prakasam responded with widespread arrests and tough crackdown on arsonists and humbled them. In spite of safety and a friendly warning from Nehru, in 1948, he dared to visit Hyderabad and met Quasi Rizvi, the leader of the Razakars, and warned him about “pushing his luck too far”. At last the Razakars had to eat their humble pie.
Though by then not in the Congress, he was elected the Leader of the Congress Legislature Party of the newly formed State of Andhra and at the ripe age old age of 81, on, Oct. 1, 1953 Prakasam headed the first Government of Andhra State in Kurnool. When doubts arose about the suitability of Kurnool for a Capital, Prakasam roared, “My Assembly sessions will be held in Open Maidan and the secretariat will function from the tents.” Though the Assembly Sessions were not held in the open, the administration was carried from tents, ABC Camps and the rented buildings, including the Official Residence of the C.M.
Within thirteen months the Ministry was voted out of power. But within that short period, Secretariat building was built, on which sprawling premises of 120 acres and the building is now located for the Prestigious Kurnool Medical College and the Teaching 1,200 bedded Government General Hospital. All the prisoners were set free to rejoice with their fraternity to enjoy their own State of Andhra. Tax on hand looms was removed.
In spite of non cooperation of Central Government and the Planning Commission, he launched the reconstruction of the Krishna Barrage (pic. below: Prakasam, at the time of foundation stone laying ceremony for the barrage). that was washed away in 1951 floods. A grateful people of Krishna Delta erected a bigger statue of Prakasam at the same place and named barrage after him. Earlier for having selected Kurnool as capital, the irate Vijayawada people had demolished his statue near the Krishna Barrage in Vijayawada. Prakasam caustically responded: “I have not asked anybody to install my statue; nor have I commanded to desecrate it. The one who has unveiled it, has the right to remove it.” To maintain the regional balance, one session of the Andhra Assembly was held at the Andhra University, Waltair. He revived his old plans to start a University at Tirupati. About 2,000 acres of the land and Rs.10,00,000/- were made available for the purpose from the Tirumala Tirumala Devasthams. Since the Governor had reservations about the manner in which the Sri Venkateswara University at Tirupati was being instituted, the Chief Justice of the High Court, Justice Koka Subba Rao was nominated the Chancellor of the University. It was inaugurated on September, 2, 1954. Guntur Medical College came into existence. An unsubstantiated argument is being made to credit the Nawab of Hyderabad for the clearance to the Nandikonda (Nagarjunasagar) Project. It was Tenneti Viswanatham, the Planning Minister in Prakasam,s Cabinet who struggled and obtained it, few days before the Ministry fell.The Ministry fell in Nov. 1954.
But Prakasam’s mission in the Service of the people of Andhra continued. Yet, he was denied the Chief Ministership after the By elections in 1955. In 1937, addressing a Public Meeting attended by thousands of people, in Kurnool, Prakasam explained the Democracy: “You, people feel that you are subordinate to the Village Officers,; who in turn are subordinates to a Deputy Tahsildar, functioning under a Tahsildar, who is subordinate to a Deputy Collector, who is under a Collector, under the Revenue Board, which is under me and ‘I am under you all. (Nenu mee andari kinda” Eye witnesses of the days of yore used to say that there was thundering applause, throughout Prakasam’s speech in chaste Telugu.
Prakasm’s body took long rest on May, 20 1957. The next day in the presence of more than a million people, the C.M. of A.P. Sri Neelam Sanjeev Reddy lead the funeral procession to the Amberpet Crematorium. It was set on fire with full State honours. In the Lok Sabha the Prime Minister, Nehru and the Home Minister, Pant, with moistened eyes and choked voice paid glowing tributes to Prakasam. A melancholic, Speaker Ananthasayanam Ayyangar agreed with the sentiments expressed by the leaders and explained that he was fortunate to have worked underPrakasam. He narrated the meteoric rise of Prakasam and particularly mentioned the Prakasam’s lionistic response during the Simon Boycott (1928). “He opened the shirt before the advancing British Military Police, blazed his chest and roared ‘Come on and shoot me, if you dare.” The Police retreated.
One side line that is worth noting here. The creation of Andhra State was in a hurry and the stop gap arrangements in the Temporary Capital at Kurnool was a Herculean task. Yet, according to Vavilala Gopalakrishnaiah, a veteran freedom fighter and a four time Legislator, Prakasam’s was the best administered Government in the history of the post independent Telugu people. So Prakasam Pantulu earned the nickname of Andhra Kesari and he was the only chief minister, probably, who died homeless.
