By Raju Mansukhani
On 25 July, 1947, His Excellency the Viceroy Lord Mountbatten addressed a conference of the Rulers and representatives of Indian States in the Chamber of Princes and stated, rather dramatically, “It is my first and my last occasion that I have the privilege of addressing you as Crown Representative. I would like to begin with by giving you a very brief history of the negotiations I have conducted and the line that I have taken up about the States. There were two distinct problems that faced me. The first was how to transfer power to British India and the second, how to fit the Indian States into the picture in a manner which would be fair and just to all concerned.”
He highlighted two mega-problems he faced: first, dealing with British India and, second, with the Indian States. He said, “Gentlemen, we decided that in less than 2 months we shall have to go through the partitioning of one of the biggest countries in the world with 400 million inhabitants. There was a reason for the speed. I was quite certain that while the British overlordship remained, no satisfactory conclusions could be reached psychologically between the parties. So, once we got the two Governments set up and separated, they would be able to try and finish off the details in an atmosphere of goodwill.”
Prepared by the Government of India in 1948, and revised in 1950, the White Paper on Indian States unfolds historic chapters, raises critical questions which were instrumental in shaping modern India and Pakistan.
Explained the Viceroy, “Now, the Indian Independence Act releases the States from all their obligations to the Crown. The States have complete freedom—technically and legally they are independent. Presently I will discuss the degree of independence which we ourselves feel is best in the interests of your own States. But there has grown up during the period of British administration, owing to the fact that the Crown Representative and the Viceroy are one and the same person, a system of coordinated administration on all matters of common concern which meant that the subcontinent of India acted as an economic entity. That link is now to be broken. If nothing can be put in its place, only chaos can result, and that chaos, I submit, will hurt the States first—the bigger the State the less the hurt and the longer it will take to feel it—but even the biggest of the States will feel itself hurt just the same as any small State. I had to address myself to the problem of the mechanics of partition—a plan against my personal desires.”
It signaled the birth of the States Departments within the future Governments. In India the States Department, he announced, would be under the admirable guidance of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel with the Reforms Commissioner, Mr VP Menon as Secretary. In Pakistan the Department would be headed by Sardar Abdur Rab Nishtar with Mr Ikramullah as the Secretary.
Explained the Viceroy, “it was necessary to set up two States Departments, one in each Government because the States are theoretically free to link their future with whichever Dominion they may care. But when I say that they are at liberty to link up with either of the Dominions, may I point out that there are certain geographical compulsions which cannot be evaded. Out of something like 565 States, the vast majority are irretrievably linked geographically with the Dominion of India. The problem therefore is of far greater magnitude with the Dominion of India than it is with Pakistan.”
“In the case of Pakistan, the States, although important, are not so numerous, and Mr. Jinnah, the future Governor-General of Pakistan, is prepared to negotiate the case of each State separately and individually. But in the case of India where the overwhelming majority of the States are involved, clearly separate negotiation with each State is out of the question,” said the Viceroy.
The White Paper, in its foreword to the 1948 edition, questioned the Butler Committee observation made in 1928 that politically there were two Indias: British India, governed by the Crown according to the statutes of Parliament and enactments of the Indian Legislature, and the Indian States under the suzerainty of the Crown and still for the most part under the personal rule of the Princes.
The Butler Report said “geographically India is one and indivisible…The problem of statesmanship is to hold the two together.” In newly-independent India, and with the process of integration of Indian States underway, the question was: Were there really two Indias? And was the problem merely to hold them together?
“A glance at the map showed that geographically India was one and indivisible,” according to the White Paper, the territories of the Indian States were dovetailed into, and closely interwoven with, those of what was then British India. Even where the map showed solid blocks of the Indian States the territories were so irregular that the States had enclaves in the Provinces and vice versa.
India was, then, not only a geographical and cultural continuum but also one economic and political entity. The problem of statesmanship in that case could not merely be to hold the two Indias together. The real problem was how to bring about a clearer appreciation on the part of all political elements in India that they were heirs to the heritage of the common culture of India, and how to weld the States and the Provinces together to raise India to her full stature, the White Paper pointed out.
On 5 July 1947 when Sardar Patel addressed the Rulers and representatives of Indian States he said, “This country with its institutions is the proud heritage of the people who inhabit it. It is an accident that some live in the States and some in British India, but all alike partake of its culture and character. We are all knit together by bonds of blood and feeling no less than of self-interest. None can segregate us into segments; no impassable barriers can be set up between us. I suggest that it is therefore better for us to make laws sitting together as friends than to make treaties as aliens. I invite my friends, the Rulers of States and their people to the Councils of Constituent Assembly in this spirit of friendliness and co-operation in a joint endeavour, inspired by common allegiance to our motherland for the common good of us all.”
(The author is a writer-researcher on history and heritage issues, and former deputy curator of Pradhanmantri Sangrahalaya.)
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