Hyderabad: The declaration of Prime Minister Narendra Modi that state governments cannot overrule the 50 per cent cap imposed by the Supreme Court has come as a big dampener to Telangana and Andhra Pradesh and is likely to snowball into a major controversy.

While Telangana legislature has passed a bill increasing the reservation for Muslim minority to 12 per cent and for the Scheduled Tribes to 10 per cent, Andhra Pradesh has passed a legislation to provide 5 per cent quota to the Kapus and three other castes. When implemented, the total quota in Telangana would increase to 62 per cent while in Andhra it would go up to 55 per cent.

Modi’s remarks, made during the election campaign in Gujrat in the context of the demand of Patels for reservation, have caused discomfiture to Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR) who had claimed that the prime minister was favourable towards increasing the reservations for Muslims and the Scheduled Tribes.

KCR has also made an initiative to make a common cause with many other states that were facing demands for reservation form various quarters. He was demanding parity with Tamil Nadu and many other states which have quota much larger than the 50 per cent cap. He also demanded that the increased quota should be provided constitutional safeguard by increasing it in the 9th Schedule of the Constitution.

The prime minister’s statement has provided fresh ammunition to the opposition Congress and the BJP in Telangana, While the BJP has been refuting KCR’s claim that Modi was positive on Muslim reservation, the Congress has launched a fresh broadside against KCR.

“This has exposed the hollowness and evil design of the TRS government and KCR for deliberately and wilfully misleading the innocent Muslims with false assurances which cannot be implemented at all,” said Shabbir Ali, leader of opposition in Telangana Legislative Council. He demanded the chief ministers of the two Telugu states of how they would honour their commitments for hiking quotas for Muslims, STs in Telangana and Kapus in Andhra Pradesh.