Asoka founded the most powerful secret society on earth: that of the Nine Unknown Men. What can have been the aim of these men?
States of India
Clickable Map of India:
Click to know about the history of the states.
After the partition of British India into India and Pakistan, there were in
India 9 provinces and about 460 princely states. Most of the princely states
within the Indian territory consented to join India. Some joined India under
their own initiative and others were convinced by Sardar Villabbhai Patel (a
very senior member of the Indian Congress) to join India. Patel who hold
negotiations with the princely states, came to an agreement with the princely
state rulers that they would continue getting monthly allowances as they were
given to them by the British. And so began the designing of the internal map of
India.
The big princely states of Mysore, Hyderabad and Kashmir remained in their
original sizes and became new Indian states. To the big provinces like Bombay,
Orissa and Bengal, small princely states around them were joined and these
provinces also became new India's states. In north India some clinging princely
states were joined together to create a new state. Rajastan was created in this
way. Along with the states which the government created, there were also regions
in India which for different reasons were subjected directly to the central
government and were called union territories. For example Himachal Pradesh in
north India was created by adjoining some princely states. It was a union
territory.
Indian leaders and politicians who had different linguistic and cultural
backgrounds demanded that the Indian states should be based on linguistic and
cultural boundaries. The central government leaders, which belonged to the
Congress party, opposed this idea. They feared that this could eventually lead
towards separation of different Indian societies from India and would break the
unity. But after a few years of opposition the central government agreed to create
Indian states based on linguistic differences.
The first step in this direction was made in 1953 when Andra Pradesh, in south
India, was created for the Telegu speakers. In 1956 began the first organized
process of creating Indian states based on linguistic differences. Among the
states created that year were, Andra Pradesh which was created by adjoining
certain parts of Telegu speaking areas from former Madras province and most of
Hyderabad. For speakers of Malyalam, the state of Kerala was created. For
Kanadda speakers the state of Mysore was created (which later on changed its
name to Karnataka) from the former Mysore state and also from Kanadda speaking
regions in Bombay, Madras and Hyderabad states. Along with states created based
on linguistic boundaries, some other big states were created by joining small
nearby states. For example Madya Pradesh, Punjab and Rajastan.
The central Indian government did not accept demands of all different cultural
leaders for an autonomous Indian state. For example, the Sikhs wanted an
autonomous Punjabi state which would have a Sikh majority with its official
language, Punjabi. The central government did not accept this demand, instead
created in 1956 the state of Punjab, which included also Hindi speakers in its
territory and did not have a Sikh majority. But the Sikhs did not give up and
continued demanding the Punjab state and in 1966, Punjab was parted into three
new states. One of three states remained with the name Punjab and most of the
Sikh population of India lived within its territory, but they were not the
complete majority of that state. Another demand the central government did not
accept was of the Maithali speakers, in present day Bihar, who also demanded a
separate autonomous state for Maithali speakers.
Maharashtra for Marathi speakers and Gujarat for Gujarati speakers were created
in 1960. Gujarat was created on northern part of the former Bombay state and
Maharashtra was created from southern Bombay state and were joined to it parts
of Madya Pradesh and Hyderabad. This process erased from India's map the state
of Hyderabad, which was now distributed within three different states. Not all
Gujaratis were enthused by the creation of new Gujarati state because this
division meant that they had to give up the city of Bombay to the Maharashtrians.
Later on other states were created. In east India the state of Assam was parted
a few times to create some new states. In 1963, Nagaland was created. In 1972,
Manipur was created and there were others small states created from parts of
Assam. In west India, Goa was established as a state in 1987. Before their
establishment as states, Goa; Manipur and Nagaland were union territories. In
the states that exist in India today, there are demands by other communities of
India to create new autonomous states for their communities.
These demands for new states in India rise and fall according to the political
power of the demanders. To point out such demands, which exist or existed, one
can point out the demand of Jammu residents for an autonomous Jammu state in
present day Kashmir. The Buddhist of Ladakh in Kashmir also demand autonomous
state. In Bihar there was a demand for a separate Maithali state for Maithali
speakers. In west Bengal, the Gurkha demands an autonomous Gurkhaland in north
Bengal. Along the borders of Orissa and Bihar some tribal communities demanded
to create Jharkhand. Similar demands of the aboriginal tribes of India exist in
Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Andra Pradesh.
In the year 2000, three new states were established in India. Jharkhand,
Chhattisgarh and Uttaranchal. Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh were created from parts
of Bihar and Orissa. And Uttaranchal was created from north Uttar Pradesh.
