After hours of trying I finally found a method to separate the actionbar tabbar from the actionbar manualy. actionbar convert tabs to list navigation if there is no room But
Use the following to customize the tabs in action bar:
Make sure that the activity where you are setting these navigation tabs has the following in its @android:theme
I still could not figure how how to detect whether the tabbar is separate i.e. below main action bar or merged (when in landscape OR larger screens even in portrait)
Another interesting thing to know is how to prevent tab bar from collapsing to a spinner when space is not enough.
As and when I find out answers to my questions above, will update the post. Until then hope the styles help few other ppl