Struggling for words

Reorganising states along linguistic lines was always a fraught, emotional matter.

On November 1, 1956, India8217;s political map was radically redrawn. In place of the administrative provinces formed by the British Raj 8212; this crazy-quilt pattern was further complicated by the accession to the Indian Union of more than 500 princely states 8212;- the boundaries of states were changed, with two glaring exceptions, along linguistic lines. This was entirely logical. The people8217;s sentiment for administration to be conducted in their mother tongue was strong. Yet, the process was painful, at times traumatic and violent. Let the story of this landmark event begin from the beginning.

By the 1920s, under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi who believed that a free and federal India must run its affairs on the basis of language, the Indian National Congress had organised itself accordingly. There was an Andhra Provincial Congress Committee though Andhra areas were part of the multi-lingual Madras Presidency. It was the same with several other PCCs. Jawaharlal Nehru had fully agreed with his mentor, at any rate until 1937, as his writings show.

After Independence, however, Nehru changed his mind 180 degrees. He was deeply apprehensive that divisions on the basis of language, on top of Partition, would further fragment India. This he was determined to prevent. He was not oblivious to the growing emotion about language but he evidently underestimated its strength. One device he used to contain it was the JVP Committee, so named because it consisted of himself, Vallabhbhai Patel and Rajendra Prasad. The three towering leaders reversed the long-standing Congress position, and strongly discouraged the demand for linguistic states. But their restraining effect was transitory.

If any one man can be said to be responsible for unleashing the avalanche of linguistic sentiment that reached its culmination exactly 52 years ago almost to the day, itwas Potti Sriramulu. A Gandhian and a passionate advocate of Andhra8217;s separation from Madras, he began a 8220;fast unto death8221; in October 1952 and passed away on December 11 and all hell broke loose. Four days later the Nehru cabinet reluctantly bowed to Sriramulu8217;s last wish. The state of Andhra came into being on May 1, 1953. This was the proverbial thin end of the wedge.

High emotion for linguistic states, like a tidal wave, swept large parts of the country such as Karnataka, Maharashtra, Orissa and so on. The Nehru government had no option but to appoint a States Reorganization Commission, consisting of Syed Fazl Ali, an eminent former judge of the Supreme Court, K. M. Pannikar, a historian and diplomat, and H.N. Kunzru, a Liberal member of Parliament. None had any connection with the Congress, past or present.

Its report, submitted in October 1955, conceded the linguistic principle but opted for retaining two bilingual states: Bombay, inhabited by Marathi-speaking and Gujarati-speaking people who wanted to separate but could not because of their bitter dispute over the the modern and cosmopolitan city of Bombay. The Punjab problem was in a class by itself, as language and religion got mixed up. The Sikhs clamoured for a Punjabi Suba in which they would be in a majority. A large number of Hindus responded by claiming that their mother tongue was Hindi, not Punjabi. Nehru made no secret of his view that a state dominated by the Akalis, the main proponents of Punjab Suba, would lead to a separatist movement along the India-Pakistan border.

Both Punjab and Bombay were thus left as they were, despite widespread violence in both states. Surprisingly, both the violence and the police response were much worse in Bombay than in the more militant Punjab. Evidently, the Maharashtrians were infuriated by the tentative move to make the metropolis of Bombay a separate city state. Nehru8217;s finance minister, a former ICS mandarin, C. D. Deshmukh, resigned, accusing the prime minister of 8220;surrendering8221; to Bombay8217;s 8220;money bags8221;. Nehru retorted: 8220;We are children of a revolution. Let no one, least of all Mr. Deshmukh, talk about money bags to us8221;.

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Nehru was so shaken by the Bombay violence that he engineered a rather bizarre initiative to counter divisive trends. Chief ministers of West Bengal and Bihar announced that their two states would be merging soon. But the quixotic move was mercifully dropped. By early 1960 it was clear that bilingual Bombay was not working. It was decided therefore to bifurcate it into Maharashtra and Gujarat. This time around nobody objected to the Bombay city going to Maharashtra though, after Raj Thackeray8217;s depredations, some may be having second thoughts. This was one of the two major decisions influenced by Indira Gandhi during her father8217;s lifetime.

Immediately afterwards, the general secretary of the then undivided Communist Party of India, Ajoy Ghosh, called on Nehru to argue that the linguistic principle, having been applied to the rest of the country, should be extended to Punjab, too. Nehru replied: 8220;I envy you, Ajoy. You don8217;t have the responsibility to rule the country and preserve its unity8221;. Both Master Tara Singh and Sant Fateh Singh who was eclipsing the Master by then continued their vigorous agitation. Once again it was Indira Gandhi, as prime minister, who conceded the Punjabi Suba in 1966.

On balance, fears about linguistic states have turned out to be largely unfounded. The fragmentation of Indian polity and society cannot be attributed to language alone. Meanwhile, feelings have changed. There is growing demand for smaller states such as Telengana and Vidarbha, three small states having been carved out in 2000.

It is impossible to conclude this narration without a reference to Uttar Pradesh. Pannikar had appended a minute to the SRC report to the effect that UP being an unwieldy state should be divided into two. Home Minister Govind Ballabh Pant, who piloted the entire reorganization scheme in Parliament, firmly said: 8220;The land of Rama and Krishna, of Ganga and Yamuna can never be divided8221;. Amidst cheers, Feroze Gandhi declared: 8220;As long as the Tiger of Kumaon Pant is with us, nobody can touch UP8221;. Uttarakhand has already been taken out of the most populous state. Ajit Singh is calling for the conversion of western UP into Harit Pradesh. And some are saying that UP should be split, not into three parts, but five.

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The writer is a Delhi based political commentator Rear View is a fortnightly column on India8217;s recent history