It is an interesting fact of India’s long political history that her boundaries — both inner and outer — have remained remarkably flexible and fluid.
Both kept expanding and contracting with the change in the ruler or the regime. Even the inner lines were often drawn, not according to geographical factors, but the discretion of the ruler, the pattern of conquest, and the convenience of revenue collection. The Mughals divided India into Subas each with its own jagirdar and mansabdar. The British drew the inner lines very differently from the Mughals.
They replaced the Subas with presidencies (such as Bengal, Bombay and Madras presidencies) and provinces (Punjab, UP, CP among others). It was, however, in the 1920s that Congress, as the leader of the freedom struggle, evolved an entirely new criterion for creating administrative divisions. Congress decided to make language the major determinant in the creation of administrative units within India. Congress also organised its provincial units on linguistic basis. And so, Congress did not have a Madras Presidency provincial Congress but Tamilnadu Congress Committee, Andhra Congress Committee, Karnataka Congress Committee and Kerala Congress Committee.
By contrast, the administrative units created by the British paid no attention to the language principle. Both the Bombay and Madras presidencies were linguistically very plural where no single language dominated. Madras Presidency (consisting of most of present-day South India minus the princely states of Hyderabad and Mysore) had a large number of Telugu, Oriya, Malayalam and Kannada speakers. Likewise, Bombay Presidency had, apart from Marathi speakers, a large number of Gujarati, Sindhi and Kannada speakers. The speakers of Kannada language were thus scattered in Madras and Bombay presidencies, and in the princely state of Mysore. However, given the Congress preference for linguistic principle for administrative purposes, it was hoped that once India became independent, its major language zones would also become the main administrative zones.
However, the vision of creating a strong India divided into administrative zones based on language received a major setback with the partition in 1947. The partition shook the foundations of a confident Indian nation. It appeared that the national unity could no longer be taken for granted and had to be protected against certain political tendencies from within. It was felt that a strong linguistic passion, bordering on chauvinism, could be one such tendency. It began to be argued that strong linguistic passions might come in the way of national considerations. The possibility that the national unity could be put to a test if strong linguistic sub-nationalisms developed, may have made the Indian leaders rethink their earlier commitment to the creation of linguistic administrative zones.
Against all odds
There was now a new reluctance to draw the boundaries on linguistic basis. This reluctance was widely shared among national leaders as diverse as Gandhi, Nehru, Patel, K M Munshi and Ambedkar. Commenting on the possibility of creating linguistic provinces, Nehru informed the Constituent Assembly immediately after independence: “First things must come first and the first thing is the security and stability of India.” The Constituent Assembly set up a Linguistic Provinces Commission, popularly known as Dar Commission, to enquire into the desirability of the creation of linguistic provinces such as Andhra, Kerala, Karnataka and Maharashtra.
The Commission, in its report, recommended against any reorganisation on linguistic basis only. The Commission emphasised that everything which helped the growth of nationalism had to go forward and everything which impeded it had to be rejected. This was also the view of the Committee, constituted by Congress on the same question in 1948 (generally known as JVP committee after its leaders Jawaharlal Nehru, Vallabhbhai Patel and Pattabhi Sitaramayya). The Congress Committee advocated the adoption of a cautious approach on creating administrative sub-units on linguistic basis. Quite clearly there was a new recognition that language was not simply a binding force in the society. It could also be a powerful dividing force.
It appears that on this question there was a divide not among the leaders, but between the leaders and the people. The reluctance of the national leaders, Constituent Assembly and the Indian government was contrasted by vehement passion among the people in favour of creating linguistic provinces. The initiative for creating linguistic provinces actually came from below.
From 1948 onwards the demand for a Punjabi Suba (linguistically homogeneous Punjabi State) began to be voiced in Punjab and the Akali Party assumed the leadership of this movement. In the Andhra area, a part of Madras State, Potti Sriramulu, a Gandhian social activist, committed suicide by going on a fast unto death in support of the demand for the creation of an Andhra state of Telugu-speaking people. The death of Potti Sriramulu triggered violence and protests in the Telugu-speaking areas in the erstwhile Madras state in support for the state of Andhra.
Conceding before the protest, Indian government announced in December 1952 the creation of a separate Andhra state consisting of the Telugu-speaking areas. Fearing that this may open a Pandora’s Box and unleash more linguistic passions all over, Nehru decided to set up a States Reorganisation Commission (SRC) in December 1953 to examine “objectively and dispassionately” the question of the reorganisation of the states of the Indian Union “so that the welfare of the people of each constituent unit as well as the nation as a whole is promoted.” The Commission was chaired by Sir Fazl Ali, ex-judge of the Supreme Court, with K M Panikkar and Hriday Nath Kunzru as the other members.
On popular demand
The SRC started working by ascertaining public opinion by inviting written memoranda, suggestions and proposals. The Commission received a total of 1,52,250 documents from the people, indicating the extent of popular interest in the question of states reorganisation. The SRC also toured large parts of the country to meet people and covered a distance of over 80,000 miles. They interviewed over 9,000 people from various walks of life. The people interviewed included members of political parties, public associations, social workers, journalists, municipal and district board representatives and other people representing cultural, educational, linguistic and local interests. The Commission also made on-the-spot studies at different places to understand the background of the problem and the popular sentiment on various aspects of reorganisation.
Quite obviously, the most important question before the SRC was to examine the possibility of creating linguistic states. The question was indeed very complex and there was no simple answer to it. There were some clear advantages in creating administrative units based on language. If administrative boundaries were based on language, people could easily identify with the administration. The language of administration would be in the language of the people. It could also facilitate literacy and education. Language being an important part of culture, it would also satisfy cultural aspirations of the people. It appears that this was how the problem was viewed by the people. A large number of memoranda submitted to the Commission made a strong plea for creating linguistic states.
The proposals and appeals argued that “linguistic groups are distinct societies and cultural entities”, “the unity of language denotes membership of a common society possessing a common cultural, literary and historical tradition”, and that in a federation “the federating units must be based on socio-cultural homogeneity as denoted by unity of language.” The memoranda made a forceful plea that in the Union of India the states must necessarily conform to the linguistic test more than any other.
However, there were some disadvantages also in submitting to the language principle in states reorganisation. Language loyalties, bolstered by administrative boundaries, could develop into sub-nationalisms and play a disruptive role. It could turn one language group against the other. The Kannada linguistic assertion could come into conflict against Tamil domination, Oriya against Bengali, and so on.
The problem was exacerbated by the fact that all the regions and administrative units created by the British had the presence of strong linguistic minorities all over. It was simply not possible to carve out administrative units in such a manner so as to make them congruent with linguistic divide. This was inevitable given the fact that language communities in India did not live in isolation and multiple language groups lived together in an entangled manner. Territories could not be neatly demarcated on the basis of language only.
For these reasons it was becoming clear to the leadership that states based exclusively on linguistic principle would create more problems than solve them. Yet the language claims emanating from the people could not be easily overlooked. Nehru highlighted three important criteria, viz., unity of India, national security specially for frontier areas, and the preservation of India’s federal structure, as crucial in carving out administrative zones. As far as language was concerned, Nehru asserted in the Lok Sabha: “I attach the greatest importance to language but refuse to associate it necessarily with a state.” He urged the Commission to see the picture of India as a whole and not piecemeal for every region.
Quite clearly, there was a hiatus between the all-India perspective of leaders and the local aspirations on the ground. The whole issue of state formation appeared very different from different vantage points. From the pan-Indian vantage point, the most important consideration was to maintain the unity of India and not do anything that might create fissiparous openings and weaken the unity. It was increasingly being seen that the language passions could weaken the unity, just as religious passions had done a decade before, in the 1940s, leading to the making of Pakistan. From the vantage point of the people, states reorganisation was an occasion to recognise and feed into the legitimate language patriotism of the people.
This, then, was the dilemma before the SRC. A new map of India was to be drawn and could not be done by entirely disregarding the wishes of the people. Giving in to the language claims might satisfy the linguistic aspirations of the people. Or, alternatively, it might elevate language patriotisms to the level of sub-nationalisms and create conflicts. The choice was not going to be easy either way.
The report of the SRC was made public in 1956 and went a long way in recognising language as a criterion in state making. All the existing states based on language were retained. In addition, the SRC created three new states — Karnataka, Kerala and Vidarbha — based on Kannada, Malayalam and Marathi respectively. However, the SRC made three exceptions to the principle of creating congruence between states and language. The report kept Andhra and Telengana separate on the ground that Telengana was a stable and a viable unit and that fears existed among its people that they might be “swamped and exploited by the people of Andhra”. It was therefore decided to keep the two Telugu-speaking zones separate.
A provision was however made for the union of the two Telugu-speaking states after the general elections of 1962, if the 2/3rd majority in the state legislature supported the union of the two.
Second exception was the refusal to divide the Marathi- and Gujarati-speaking people of the Bombay state. Likewise, the demand to make Punjab into an exclusive Punjabi-speaking state, by separating Hindi-speaking areas from it, was also not accepted. Punjab was to remain a mixed zone of Punjabi and Hindi speakers. In both the cases the SRC decided to retain the composite character of the regions, Punjab and Bombay, respectively, and not split them up on the basis of language.
Strong reactions
As soon as the contents of the report were made public, very strong reactions came from many regions. In the north, Master Tara Singh, a vociferous advocate of the Punjabi Suba movement, condemned the report for not making Punjab an exclusively Punjabi-speaking state. In western India, both the Marathi and Gujarati speakers were up in arms against the report and against each other. Both wanted a separate linguistic state of their own and wanted Bombay city to be a part of their state. In south, controversy arose over the proposed merger of the erstwhile Mysore state with the newly created Karnataka.
The representatives from Mysore protested against the merger of their state with what they considered to be a “backward Karnataka” and were apprehensive that their growth would be stunted and retarded. But the most violent reaction to the report came from western India, where a huge riot broke out in which nearly 300 people were killed and over 500 injured.
It was then in 1960 that the erstwhile Bombay state was divided between a Marathi-speaking Maharashtra and a Gujarati-speaking Gujarat, with Bombay city going to Maharashtra. Finally, in 1966, Indira Gandhi, the new prime minister of India, accepted the demand of the Akali Party to make Punjab an exclusive Punjabi-speaking area. The Hindi-speaking areas were separated from Punjab and constituted into a separate state of Haryana. It was thus that the prolonged process of carving out new states that was started in 1956, culminated in 1966, a decade later. In the new boundaries that were drawn, the language principle was given the utmost consideration. This was against the wishes of the leaders, but perfectly in harmony with what the people wanted.
Bowing to pressure
Thus it was that on the question of linguistic provinces the top leadership gave in to the pressures from below. Since then this has generally been treated as the legitimate criterion for redrawing the administrative boundaries of the old states. In the 1950s many people warned Nehru against this on the ground that it might lead to a linguistic balkanisation of the country.
It was predicted that states thus formed would soon develop strong regional identities based on language and culture and would even be prepared to go to war against each other. This would retard the process of nation formation, and the growth of a national culture. It can however be concluded that the worst fears expressed in the 1950s and 1960s have turned out not to be the case. The disastrous consequences of linguistic chauvinism, as anticipated, have not materialised.
On the other hand, the Indian polity appears to have evolved a suitable mechanism which, in consistence with national priorities, can be utilised for redrawing the administrative boundaries of the country. The creation of linguistic states, in the context of the 1950s, appeared to many to be the problem and an obstacle in the creation of a national culture, language and polity. However, it should now be possible to look upon the linguistic state, not as a problem, but rather as a solution to the problem of strong linguistic passions.
The SRC, to its credit, decided to listen to the voices of the people and allowed the popular preference to supersede its own reservations on the creation of linguistic states. The work of the States Reorganisation Commission, it can be safely concluded, was a victory of the people and a triumph of the Indian democracy.
(The writer teaches history at Ambedkar University Delhi)