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1. Jagatheesan Chandrasekharan Says:
   December 18th, 2009 at 1:12 pm

   Father of the Prabuddha Bharath Constitution
   Ambedkar proved right

   After resigning from Nehru’s Cabinet as Law Minister over the controversial Hindu Code Bill in 1951, Dr. B.R. Ambedkar spent most of his time writing at his 26, Alipore Road residence in Delhi’s Civil Lines. Fresh from drafting and the successful piloting of the Indian Constitution in the Constituent Assembly, he entered one of his most productive writing phases and left behind a great body of literature on a wide range of subjects.

   Dr. Ambedkar, who remained a Rajya Sabha member till his death in December, 1956, made occasional appearances in the house of elders to express his views on contemporary issues that exercised him. Though reading and writing on Hinduism and Buddhism consumed most of his time, the everyday Indian political situation of the 1950s did not escape his attention. Two of those issues that need to be relooked today are the reorganisation of the states and his idea of the politics of majority and minority castes.

   As the issue of reorganisation of Indian states on the basis of language raged in the 1950s Dr. Ambedkar compiled his opinions into a book, Thoughts on Linguistic States, which was published in 1955. The book is as relevant today as it was then. Dr. Ambedkar felt that creation of states should be based on equal distribution of population and their capitals should be centrally located in those states. Dr. Ambedkar criticised the confusion prevailing in the ruling camp in the 1950s on linguistic states.

   He said that one language in a state can unite people and two languages are sure to divide them. “Culture is conserved by language”, he said. He supported linguistic states for two reasons. One, to make the path to democracy easy and the other to remove racial and cultural tensions.
   His opinions find reflection in today’s situations in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Assam or even Maharashtra. The formula he put forth for division of states in his book now seems prophetic. He then had envisioned the division of Bihar into two: north Bihar with Patna as capital and Ranchi being the capital of south Bihar.

   The division did happen, though it took almost fifty years. For him Andhra and Hyderabad (Telangana) were never one state. He always perceived them as two separate entities. The demand for a separate Telangana never really died down.

   More ominous seems to be his prescription for Uttar Pradesh. He sought to divide Uttar Pradesh, which was a six Crore population state in 1955 into three states of two crore population each. Western Uttar Pradesh with Meerut, Central Uttar Pradesh with Kanpur and Eastern Uttar Pradesh with Allahabad as capitals. He clearly conceptualised that smaller states were always better administered.

   Dr. Ambedkar’s recommendations for Maharashtra will be too startling for today’s reader. He proposed the creation of a city state of Bombay (Mumbai) with a rider that the taxes collected from Bombay should be equally divided among the three states he proposed to carve out of rest of Maharashtra. His proposal was for a western Maharashtra, Marathwada or central Maharashtra and eastern Maharashtra comprising Vidharbha.

   He had also wanted to split Madhya Pradesh into north and south, which eventually became Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh many decades later. While accepting the linguistic states as a matter of principle, he proposed further division of single language states for better administration, access to administration for people of various regions within the geographic entity and also their sentiments.

   [ Excerpts from the Thoughts On Linguistics States, By Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar

   SUMMARY OF PRICIPLES COVERING THE ISSUE

   For the sake of the reader I summarise below the principles which should underly the creation of Linguistic States which are already enunciated In the foregoing pages but which lie about scattered. These principles may be staled as below :
   (1) The idea of having a mixed State must be completely abandoned.
   (2) Every State must be an unilingual State. One State, one language.
   (3) The formula one State, one language must not be confused with the formula of one language, one State.
   (4) The formula one language, one State means that all people speaking one language should be brought under one Government irrespective of area, population and dissimilarity of conditions among the people speaking the language. This is the idea that underlies the agitation for a united Maharashtra with Bombay. This is an absurd formula and has no precedent for it. It must be abandoned. A people speaking one language may be cut up into many States as is done in other parts of the world.
   (5) Into how many States a people speaking one language should be cut up, should depend upon (1) the requirements of efficient administration, (2) the needs of the different areas, (3) the sentiments of the different areas, and (4) the proportion between the majority and minority.
   (6) As the area of the State increases the proportion of the minority to the majority decreases and the position of the minority becomes precarious and the opportunities for the majority to practise tyranny over the minority become greater. The States must therefore be small.
   (7) The minorities must be given protection to prevent the tyranny of the majority. To do this the Constitution must be amended and provisions must be made for a system on plural member constituencies (two or three) with cumulative voting ]

   The most fascinating of Dr. Ambedkar’s proposal was about making Hyderabad, the country’s second capital for an obvious reason — this southern city is equidistant from various regions of the country. The second reason for mooting this idea was to ease the north-south tension.

   [ Excerpts from the Thoughts On Linguistics States, By Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar

   INDIA AND THE NECESSITY OF A SECOND CAPITAL
   A WAY TO REMOVE TENSION BETWEEN THE NORTH AND THE SOUTH

   Can India afford to have one Capital ? That India has now one capital does not close the question. If the Capital of India is not satisfactorily located, now is the time for considering the question.
   Since the departure of the British, India has only one capital and that is Delhi. Before the British, India has always had two capitals. During the Moghal period, India had Delhi as one Capital and Shrinagar in Kashmir as another Capital. When the British came they too had two capitals, one was Calcutta and another was Simla. Even when they left Calcutta for Delhi, they retained Simla as their summer Capital. The two capitals maintained by the Moghuls and by the British were the results of climatic conditions. Neither the British nor the Moghuls were able to live in Delhi or in Calcutta continuously for 12 months. The summer months in Delhi were unbearable to the Moghuls. They made Shrinagar their second capital for summer months. The summer months in Calcutta were equally unbearable to the British. They, therefore, established a second capital. To these climatic conditions must now be added three other conditions. There was no popular Government when the Moghuls ruled or when the British ruled. Now we have popular Government and the convenience of the people is an important factor. Delhi is most inconvenient to the people of the South. They suffer the most from cold as well as distance. Even the Northern people suffer in the summer months. They do not complain because they are nearer home and they are nearer the seat of power. Second is the feeling of the Southern people and the third is the consideration of Defence. The feeling of the Southern people is that the Capital of their Country is far away from them and that they are being ruled by the people of Northern India. The third consideration is of course more important. It is that Delhi is a vulnerable place. It is within bombing distance of the neighbouring countries. Although India is trying to live in peace with its neighbours it cannot be assumed that India will not have to face war sometime or other and if war comes, the Government of India will have to leave Delhi and find another place for its location. Which is the place to which the Government of India can migrate ? A place that one can think of is Calcutta. But Calcutta is also within bombing distance from Tibet. Although India and China today are friends, how long the friendship would last no one can definitely say. The possibility of conflict between India and China remains. In that event Calcutta would be useless. The next town that could be considered as a refuge for the Central Government is Bombay. But Bombay is a port and our Indian Navy is too poor to protect the Central Government if it came down to Bombay. Is there a fourth place one could think of? I find Hyderabad to be such a place. Hyderabad Secunderabad and Bolarum should be constituted into a Chief Commissioner' s Province and made a second capital of India. Hyderabad fulfils all the requirements of a capital for India. Hyderabad is equidistant to all States. Anyone who looks at the table of distances given below will realise it:

   From Delhi – miles From Hyderabad – miles
   To Bombay 798 440
   To Calcutta 868 715
   To Madras 1198 330
   To Karnul 957 275
   To Trivandrum 1521 660
   To Patiala 124 990
   To Chandigarh 180 1045
   To Lucknow 275 770

   From the defence point of view it would give safety to the Central Government. It is equidistant from all parts of India. It would give satisfaction to the South Indian people that their Government is sometimes with them. The Government may remain in Delhi during winter months and during other months it can stay in Hyderabad. Hyderabad has all the amenities which Delhi has and it is a far better City than Delhi. It has all the grandeur which Delhi has. Buildings are going cheap and they are really beautiful buildings, far superior to those in Delhi. They are all on sale. The only thing that is wanting is a Parliament House which the Government of India can easily build. It is a place in which Parliament can sit all the year round and work, which it cannot do in Delhi. I do not see what objection there can be in making Hyderabad a second capital of India. It should be done right now while we are reorganising the States.
   Hyderabad, Secunderabad and Bolarum should be constituted into a second capital of India. Fortunately, it can be very easily done with satisfaction to the whole of South India, to Maharashtra and to the Andhras.
   This is another remedy for easing the tension between the North and the South ]

   In Karnataka State the BBMP has created 198 wards from just less than 100 wards. Even though the number of seats reserved for SC/ ST is not proportionate to 198, the election is will be held in February. The BBMP has been bifurcated to 20000 and 30000 population. When such is the case why not States be bifurcated for every 2 crore population? Already number of States have been created after Independence. There is no problem. It is for easy administration.

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