Integration of Princely States

Unifying under one

administration, post- Partition
India and the princely states
was perhaps the most important
task facing the political
leadership.

In colonial India, nearly 40 per
cent of the territory was
occupied by fifty-six small and
large states ruled by the
princes who enjoyed varying
degrees of autonomy under the
system of British paramountcy.

In 1947 the future of the
princely states once in the
British left became a matter of
concern.
The Indian nationalists could
hardly accept a situation where
the unity of free India would be
endangered by hundreds of large

or small independent or
autonomous states interspersed
within it which were sovereign.
Besides , the people of the
states had participated in the
process of nation-in-the-making
from the end of nineteenth
century and developed strong

feelings of Indian nationalism.
The nationalist leaders in
British India and in the states
rejected the claim of any state
to independence and repeatedly
declared that independence for a
princely state was not an
option- the only option open

being whether the state would
accede to India or Pakistan on
basis of contiguity of its
territory and the wishes of its
people.
With great skill and masterful
diplomacy and using both
persuasion and pressure, Sardar

Vallabhbhai Patel succeeded in
integrating the hundreds of
princely states with the Indian
union in two stages. Some states
had shown wisdom and realism and
perhaps a degree of patriotism
by joining the Constituent
Assembly in April 1947.But the

majority of princes had stayed
away and a few, such as those of
Travancore, Bhopal and
Hyderabad, publicly announced
their desire to claim an
independent status.
On 27 June 1947, Sardar Patel
assumed additional charge of the

newly created states department
with V.P.Menon as its
Secratory.Sardar Patel told
menon at the time that the
situation held dangerous
potentialities and that if we
did not handle it promptly and
effectively, our hard-earned

freedom might disappear through
the states door.
Fearful of the rising tide of
the peoples movement in their
states, and of the more extreme
agenda of the redical wing of
the Congress, as also Patels
reputation for firmness and even

ruthlessness, the princes
responded to Patels appeal and
all but three of them
Junagarh, Jammu and Kashmir and
Hyderabad acceded to India by
15
th
August 1947.

JUNAGARH

Junagarh was a small state on
the coast of Saurasthra
surrounded by Indian territority
and therefore, without any
geoghraphical contiguity with
Pakistan. Yet, its nawab
announced accension of his state
to Pakistan on 15
th
August 1947,

even though the people of the
state overwhelmingly, Hindi
desired to join India.
The Indian Nationalist Leaders
had for decades stood for the
sovreignity of the people
against the claims of the
princes. It was therefore not

surprising that in Junagarhs
case Nehru and Patel agreed that
the final voice should be that
of the people as ascertained
through the plebiscite. The
deewan of Junagarh Shah Nawab
Bhutto, father of the more
famous Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, now

decided to invite the government
of India to intervene. Indian
troops thereafter marched into
the state. A plebiscite was held
in the state in February 1948
which went overwhelmingly in
favour of joining India.


KASHMIR
The state of Kashmir bordered on
both India and Pakistan. Ruler
Hari Singh was Hindu while,
nearly 75% of the population was
Muslim. Hari Singh too did not
accede either to India or
Pakistan. Fearing democracy in

India and communalism in
Pakistan he hoped to stay out of
both and to continue to wield
power as an independent ruler.
The popular political forces led
by the national conference and
its leader Sheikh Abdullah
however, wanted to join India.

The Indian political leaders
wanted the people of Kashmir to
decide whether to link their
fate with India or Pakistan. On
22
nd
October, with the onset of
winter several Pathan tribesmen,
led unofficially by Pakistani
army officers invaded Kashmir

and rapidly pushed towards
Srinagar, the capital of
Kashmir. The ill-trained army of
the Maharaja proved no match for
the invading forces. In panic of
24
th
October the Maharaja
appealed to India for military
assistance. Nehru even at this

stage did not favor ascension
without ascertain the will of
the people. But, Mountbatten the
governor-general pointed out
that under international law
India could send its troops to
Kashmir only after the states
formal accession to India.

Sheikh Abdullah and Sardar Patel
too insisted on accession. And
so 26
th
October the Maharaja
acceded to India and also agreed
to install Abdullah as head of
the states administration. Even
though both the national
conference and the Maharaja

wanted firm and permanent
accession, India in conformity
with its democratic commitment
and Mountbattens advice
announced that it would hold a
referendum on the accession
decision once peace and law and

order had been restored in the
valley.
After the accession the cabinet
took the decision to immediately
fly troops to Srinagar. This
decision was bolstered by its
approval by Gandhi ji who told
Nehru that there should be no

submission to evil in Kashmir
and that the raiders had to be
driven out. On 27
th
October
nearly 100 planes airlifted men
and weapons to Srinagar to join
the battle against the raiders.
Srinagar was first held and then
the raiders were gradually

driven out of the valley though
they retained control over parts
of the state and the armed
conflict continued for months.
Fearful of the dangers of a full
scale war between India and
Pakistan the government of India
agreed on 30h December 1947, on

Mountbattens suggestion to
refer the Kashmir to the
security council of the United
Nations asking for vacation of
aggression by Pakistan.

HYDERABAD

Hyderbad was the largest state
in India and was completely
surrounded by Indian territory.
The Nizam of Hyderabad was the
3
rd
Indian ruler who did not
accede to india before 15
th

August. Instead, he claimed amn
independent status, and

encouraged by Pakistan, began to
expand its armed forces. But,
Sardar Patel was in no hurry to
force a decision on him,
especially as Mountbatten was
interested in acting as an
intermediary in arriving at a
negotiated settlement with him.

Time, Patel felt, was on Indias
side, especially as the Nizam
made a secret commitment not to
join Pakistan and the British
government, refused to give
Hyderabad the status of a
dominion. But, Patel made it
clear that India would not

tolerate an isolated spot which
would destroy the very union
which we have built up with our
blood and toil.
In November 1947 the government
of India signed a standstill
agreement with the Nizam, hoping
that while the negotiations

proceeded the latter would
introduce representative
government in the state making
the state making the task of
merger easier. But, the Nizam
had other plans. He engaged the
services of the leading British
lawyer Sir Walter Monckturn, a

friend of Mountbatten to
negotiate with the government of
India on his behalf. The Nizam
hoped to prolong negotiations
and in the meanwhile build up
his military strength and forced
India to accept his sovereignty
or alternatively he might

succeed in acceding to Pakistan,
especially in view of the
tension between India and
Pakistan over Kashmir.
There was rapid growth with
official help of the militant
Muslim communal organization
Itihad Ul Muslimin and its

paramilitary wing the Razakars.
On 2
nd
August 1947 the Hyderabad
styate Congress launched a
powerful Satyagraha movement to
force democratization on the
Nizam. Nearly 20000 Satyagrahis
were jailed. As a result of
attacks by the Razakar and

repression by the state
authorities thousands of people
fled the state and took shelter
in temporary camps in Indian
territory. The state Congress
led movement now took to arms.
By then a powerful communist led
peasant struggle had developed

in the Telengana region of the
state from the latter half of
1946. The movement which had
wanted due the severity of the
state repression by the end of
1946 recovered its vigour when
peasant dalams organized defense
of the people against attacks by

the Razakars, attacked big
landlords and distributed their
lands among the peasants and the
landless.

PEPSU
In contrast to the south and
Bombay where language

differences were more important
than religious differences,
religious differences and
communal organizations on
religious lines were more
important in the Punjab in the
19
th
century and upto the
partition of the country in 1947

in which Punjab and the Shiekhs
were at the centre of the storm
the Gurudwara reform movement of
the 1920s brought a critical
change in the institutional
vitality and political
organizations of the Sikha as a
community for it brought into

being two organizations which
became the central religious and
political institutions of the
Sikh. These are Shiromani
Gurudwara Pravandak Committee, a
central managing committee for
the Punjab Gurudwaras which
controls the Sikh shrines and

its vast resources and the Akali
Dal the political movement which
led the Gurudwara reform
movement which became the
principal political organization
of the Sikha in Punjab before
and after independence.


NORTH-EAST
The Reorganization of Assam
In Assam and the north-east
special problems arose
immediately after independence
which made states
reorganization a far more
difficult and violent process

than elsewhere at the time for
here the central government
faced explicit unequivocal
sessionist demands from non-
Hindu tribal groups.
Several sets of ethnic
confrontations intersect in
Assam between Hindus and Muslim

linguistic groups plains
peoples and tribal hill people
plains tribals and non-tribals
and the 9indigenous population
and the large migrant
population. Here the specific
problems of state reorganization
centred around the demands of

the tribal people though the
severe sets of ethnic issues at
time overlapped and influenced
each other. Moreover in the
1990s new insurrectionary and
secessionist have arisen in
Assam bith among the plain
tribal people among the dominant

Assamese Hindu population as
well.
At Independence, there was a
multiplicity of tribal groups in
Assam, speaking a wide variety
of mother tongues. Although the
languages of tribal people are
entirely distinct from Assamese

and although Christianity spread
to many of them, language and
religions were secondary issues
in the demands of the spokesmen
and the tribal people for
separation from the province of
Assam and secession from India.
The main argument for separation

and secession was that tribal
people were simply not Indian at
all.
The Naga and the Mizoram
insurrections
The Naga demand for secession
was made by the famous Naga
leader Angami Zapu phizo, at the

time of Independence when the
Assamese government violated an
agreement with the Naga National
Council to recognize it as the
principal political and
administrative force in the Naga
Hill District and proceeded to
extend its administration to

the Naga area. When the Naga
movement turned into a violent
insurrection, the central
government adopted a policy of
suppression by military means,
which at times involved an
entire Indian army division and
various other paramilitary and

police forces, the complete
suspension of civil liberties in
the hills and other drastic
measures such as the regrouping
of villages to separate them
from the guerrillas.
At the same time, as in the
Punjab, the central government

demonstrated its willingness to
negotiate with moderate non-
secessionist leaders. After
prolonged negotiation the
central government agreed to the
formation of Nagaland as the
sixteenth state of the Indian
union in March, 1960s. In the

meantime, the Indian army
continued its military
operations against the Naga
rebels, which persisted until
1978, despite the arrangement of
cease-fire agreements in 1964
and 1975.


CONCLUSION
Many alternative explanations
for the resurgence of regional
and communal conflicts in the
past 15 years have been offered
including the persistence of
immutable primordial cleavages
in Indian society their

underlined bases in economic or
class differences and specific
policies and political tactics
pursued by the central and state
governments. The analysis here
has given primacy to the latter
however; it is also true that
the problems in Punjab in the

North-Eastern region and in
Kashmir have been complicated by
the presence of other factors
which were not present in the
linguistic reorganization of
states which took place during
the Nehru period. In the Punjab
case the most important

difference is the fact that the
Sikhs are a separate religious
as well as linguistic groups. In
the north-east the issues have
been tackled by the presence
there of several tribal
minorities whose demands have
been secessionist by the

migration of large number of
people from other provinces of
India, particularly West Bengal
to the north-eastern states of
Assam and Tripura especially by
illegal migrations from
Bangladesh as well and by the
presence of large numbers of

both Hindus and Muslims among
the migrant and local
populations. In Kashmir the
issues have been complicated by
the internationalization of the
dispute. The special status
which Kashmir has had since its
integration into the Indian

union and its perceived integral
connection with the opposed
finding ideologies of the two
principal successor states of
the Bristish Raj. Nevertheless,
the argument here is that the
policies pursued by the
government of India after

Nehrus death have played a
major role in the
intensification of conflicts in
these three regions and have in
the process highlighted a major
structural problem in the Indian
political system. Although the
same tensions existed in the

Nehru years, central government
policies then favoured pluralist
solutions, non-intervention in
state politics except in a
conciliatory role or as a last
resort and preservation of
separation between central and
state politics, allowing

considerable autonomy for the
latter.