How did Sardar Vallabhbahi Patel succeeded in integrating the hundreds of princely states with the Indian Union?

The variegated pattern of the British Congress of India and the different stratagems through which the various parts of the country was brought under colonial rule had resulted in two-fifths of the subcontinent being ruled by Indian princes.

The areas ruled by the Indian princes included Indian States like Hyderabad, Mysore and Kashmir that were equal in size to many European countries, and numerous small states who counted their population in the thousands. The common feature was that all of them, big or small, recognized the paramount of the British government.

In return, the British guaranteed the princes against army threat to their autocratic power, internal or external most of the princely states were run as unmitigated aristocracies, with absolute power concentrated in hands of ruler.

The burden of land tax was heavy and there was usually much less of the rule of law and civil liberties. The vast majority of the states were the bastions of economic, social, political and educational backwardness.

Ultimately, it was the British government that was responsible for the situation in which the Indian states found themselves in. As the national movement grew in strength, the princes were increasingly called upon to play the role of bulwarks of reaction.

Any sympathy with nationalism was looked upo9n with extreme disfavor. Many a potential reforms among the rulers was gradually drained of initiative by the constant surveillance and interference exercised by the British resident.

The advance of the national movement in British India, and the accompanying increase in political consciousness about democracy, responsible government and civil liberties had an inevitable impact on the people of the states. In the first and second decade of the twentieth century, runaway terrorists from British India seeking shelter in the states became agents of politicization.

A much more powerful influence was exercised by the Khilafat and Non- cooperation movement. Around this time, and under its impact, numerous local organizations of the states people came into existence. The process came to a head in December 1927 with the counting of All India States People Conference under initiative of Balwant Mehta, Maniklal Kothari and G.R. Abhyankar.

With the impending lapse of paramount the question of future of the princely states became a vital one. The more ambitions rulers or their dewans (like Hyderabad, Bhopal, Travancore) were dreaming of an independence which would keep them as autocratic as before and such hopes received considerable, encouragement from the government of India’s political department under Conrad Cornfield till Mountbatten enforced a more realistic policy.

Meanwhile, a new upsurge of the states people’s movement had begun in 1946-47, demanding everywhere political rights and elective representation in the Constituent Assembly and containing in some places considerable socially radical possibilities as in case of Travancore and Hyderabad.

The congress criticized the cabinet mission plan for not providing for elected members from states. Nehru presided over Udaipur and Gwalior session of the All India States Peoples Conference (December 1945 and April 1947) and declared at Gwalior that States refusing to join the Constituent Assembly would be treated as hostile.

But verbal speeches and threats apart, the congress leadership or more precisely, Sardar Patel who took charge of the new states department in 1947 together with V.P. Menon who became secretary tackled the situation in what had become the standard practice of the party: using popular movement as a leer to extort concessions from princes while simultaneously restraining from or even using force to suppress them once the price had been brought to heel as in Hyderabad.

The pattern had already been indicated in Kashmir in 1946 when Sheikh Abdullah was arrested for leading quit Kashmir movement against unpopular and despotic Maharaja. Nehru rushed to Kashmir leader’s support and was even arrested for defying ban on entry in state.

Patel,” however, very soon opened negotiations with the Kashmir’s Prime Minister, which enthusiastic in Maharaja of Kashmir’s accession to India after raiders from Pakistan invaded the state in October 1947. Patel assured the princes: The Congress was no enemies of the princely order but on the other hand wish they and the people under their aegis are prosperity, contentment and happiness.

The incorporation of Indian states took place in two phases, with a skillful combination of baits and threats of mass-pressure in both. By 15 August 1947, all states except Kashmir, Junagarh and Hyderabad had agreed to sign an instrument of Accession with India acknowledging central authority over the three areas of defense, external affairs and communications.

The princes agreed to this fairly easily for so far they were surrendering only what they had, never had and there was no change as yet in internal political structures.

The much more difficult process of ‘integration’ of stgates with neighbouring provinces or into new units like Kathiawar union, Vindhya and Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan or Himachal Pradesh, along with internal constitutional changes in states which for some years retained their old boundaries (Hyderabad, Mysore, Cochin-Travancore) was also accomplished within the remarkably short period of hitu more than a year. Here the principal bait offered was that of very generous privy pluses, while some princes were also made into governors or Rajapramukhs.

The rapid unification of India is certainly Sardar Patel’s greatest achievement. But we must not forget the considerable role played here too, by the existence of or at least the potential presence of mass pressures. Thus, the eastern states union formed by recalcitrant princes assumed in December 1947 in the fare of powerful praja mandal agitations in Orissa states like Nilgiri, Dhankamal and Talcher.

Junagarh in Kathiawar whose Muslims ruler tried to join Pakistan was brought to heel by combination of popular agitation with Indian police action. The Congress supporters in Mysore launched “Mysore Chalo” agitation in September, 1947. V.P. Menon persuaded the Travancore Dewan to give up his dream of separate state.

Thus, owing to skills of Sardar Patel, the princely states acceded to Indian Union.