New Delhi, Jan. 6 (PTI): The Muslims of Hyderabad do not want a Telangana state but those in the rest of the Telangana region do, the Srikrishna Committee report says.

The committee notes that Hyderabad’s Muslims, who make up 41 per cent of the city’s population and speak Urdu rather than Telugu, would feel more secure in a united Andhra Pradesh.

However, Muslims in the Telangana districts feel they have remained backward in Andhra Pradesh and will have better access to education and employment in a new state.

“(The) expectation of an increase in reservation benefits (to 12 per cent) in the new state is one of the major reasons...” the 461-page report says.

Muslims now receive four per cent reservation under the Extremely Backward Classes category in Andhra Pradesh. The community has a litany of complaints: lack of jobs, Urdu teachers, funds for Urdu-medium schools and scholarships for minorities, loss of wakf land, and the state’s failure to implement Urdu as the second language.

The Muslims from Telangana districts have told the Srikrishna Committee there is no communal or cultural divide between Hindus and minorities in the region and they will be safe in a new state.

But the Muslims of Hyderabad “would feel more secure in the larger state”, the report says. “Most of them reside in the old city and do not speak Telugu. Residents of Muslim mohallas (neighbourhoods) were found to be the most disengaged from the Telangana issue.”

In Hyderabad, Muslims identify primarily with the city and not necessarily with the region of Telangana, the report says. Most of the city’s Muslims consider the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Musalmeen (MIM) their political representative.

The report says the MIM prefers a united Andhra Pradesh to a bifurcation. In case of an inevitable separation, it prefers a Rayala-Telangana with Hyderabad as its capital (the Srikrishna Committee’s option 3 that it itself says is not practicable because it is likely to be rejected by both pro-Telangana and pro-united Andhra groups).

Muslims in Rayalaseema and coastal Andhra too favour a united state and believe that the state’s resources should be shared equitably, the report says. “The concentration of Muslims in Hyderabad and their homogeneous distribution in Rayalaseema... can explain their preferences.”

In a Telangana state, Muslims would make up about 12.5 per cent of the population (though this falls to 8.4 per cent if Hyderabad is excluded). In a Rayala-Telangana state, Muslims would have a similar strength of about 12.5 per cent. In united Andhra Pradesh, the community accounts for just above 9 per cent of the population.

The report says the Christians in Telangana want statehood because they feel that most of the benefits of development have so far gone to coastal Andhra.

“Reservations are the issue here as coastal Andhra Christians (mostly Malas) have done better than Telangana and Rayalaseema Christians,” it says. Christians in the non-Telangana regions want Andhra Pradesh to remain united. “They contend they have all contributed to the progress in Hyderabad by investing a large section of their manpower (labour force) and capital to an extent. They feel that the culture and customs in the two regions are similar,” the report says.