A fast revision cut of Class 12 Political Science, Politics in India Since Independence,
Book 2 Chapter 1, Challenges of Nation Building. Every definition, every date, every figure
and every named person the paper asks for, with nothing in between. Read the full notes first; read
this the morning of the exam.
1 All the Definitions
Partition. The division of British India into India and Pakistan. It was decided that
what was till then known as ‘India’ would be divided into two countries, ‘India’ and
‘Pakistan’.
Two-nation theory. The theory advanced by the Muslim League that India consisted of not
one but two ‘people’, Hindus and Muslims. That is why it demanded Pakistan, a separate country for
the Muslims. The Congress opposed this theory and the demand for Pakistan.
Principle of religious majorities. The rule on which partition was carried out. It
basically means that areas where the Muslims were in majority would make up the territory of
Pakistan; the rest was to stay with India.
Division of hearts. The phrase that the survivors themselves used to describe partition,
and that writers, poets and film-makers in India and Pakistan have often used while recounting its
trauma.
Secular nation. The ideal that India should not be a country that gave superior status to
adherents of one faith and inferior status to those who practised another; that all citizens would
be equal irrespective of their religious affiliation; and that being religious or a believer would
not be a test of citizenship. This ideal was enshrined in the Indian Constitution.
Princely States. The several large and small states ruled by princes, which enjoyed some
form of control over their internal affairs as long as they accepted British supremacy. They are
the other half of British India, alongside the British Indian Provinces, which were directly under
the control of the British government.
Paramountcy. Also called suzerainty of the British crown: the arrangement under
which the Princely States kept internal control so long as they accepted British supremacy. Just
before Independence the British announced that with the end of their rule, paramountcy would also
lapse.
Instrument of Accession. The document signed by the rulers of most of the princely
states, which meant that their state agreed to become a part of the Union of India.
Standstill Agreement. The agreement the Nizam of Hyderabad entered into with India in
November 1947, for a year, while negotiations with the Indian government were going on. He wanted
an independent status for Hyderabad.
Merger Agreement. The document the Government of India succeeded in persuading the
Maharaja of Manipur into signing in September 1949, after the Legislative Assembly split over the
question of merger.
Razakars. The para-military force the Nizam unleashed on the people of Hyderabad. Their
atrocities and communal nature knew no bounds: they murdered, maimed, raped and looted, targeting
particularly the non-Muslims.
Vishalandhra movement. The name given to the movement for a separate Andhra. It demanded
that the Telugu speaking areas should be separated from the Madras province, of which they were a
part, and be made into a separate Andhra province.
States Reorganisation Commission. The commission appointed by the Central Government in
1953 to look into the question of redrawing of the boundaries of states. Its report accepted that
the boundaries of the state should reflect the boundaries of different languages.
Universal adult franchise. The right to vote extended to every adult citizen. Manipur was
the first part of India to hold an election based on it, in June 1948.
2 The Three Challenges
Unity with diversity
The first and the immediate challenge: to shape a nation that was united, yet accommodative
of the diversity in our society. India was a land of continental size and diversity, and it was
widely believed that such a country could not remain together for long.
Establishing democracy
The Constitution granted fundamental rights and extended the right to vote to every citizen,
and India adopted representative democracy based on the parliamentary form of government. But a
democratic constitution is necessary but not sufficient for establishing a democracy; democratic
practices had to be developed in accordance with it.
Development for all
To ensure the development and well-being of the entire society and not only of some sections.
The Constitution laid down equality and special protection for socially disadvantaged groups and
religious and cultural communities, and set out the welfare goals in the Directive Principles of
State Policy. The real challenge was to evolve effective policies for economic development and
eradication of poverty.
3 Partition: the four difficulties
| Difficulty | What it was | How it was settled |
|---|---|---|
| 1. No single belt | There was no single belt of Muslim majority areas; there were two areas of concentration, one in the west and one in the east |
Pakistan was made of two territories, West and East Pakistan, separated by a long expanse of Indian territory |
| 2. Unwilling areas | Not all Muslim majority areas wanted to be in Pakistan; Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan, ‘Frontier Gandhi’, leader of the North Western Frontier Province, was staunchly opposed to the two-nation theory |
His voice was simply ignored and the NWFP was made to merge with Pakistan |
| 3. Mixed provinces | Punjab and Bengal were Muslim majority provinces with very large non-Muslim majority areas |
Both were bifurcated by religious majority at the district or even lower level; the decision could not be made by the midnight of 14-15 August |
| 4. Minorities | The most intractable problem: lakhs of Hindus and Sikhs on the Pakistan side and an equally large number of Muslims on the Indian side of Punjab and Bengal were trapped |
It was never settled; violence started as soon as partition became certain and soon went out of control |
The scheme of partition included no plan for a transfer of population across the border.
The chapter is explicit: no one had quite anticipated the scale of this problem, and no one had any
plans for handling it. This is exactly what NCERT Exercise 1 tests.
4 The Cost of Partition, in Numbers and Names
- About 80 lakh people were forced to migrate across the new border.
- Between five to ten lakh people were killed in partition related violence.
- The Muslim population in India was still 10-12 per cent of the total population in
1951. - Cities that became divided into ‘communal zones’: Lahore, Amritsar and Kolkata.
- What got divided besides territory: financial assets, tables, chairs, typewriters,
paper-clips, books and the musical instruments of the police band; the employees of the
government and the railways were also ‘divided’. - The other religious minorities the chapter names: Sikhs, Christians, Jains, Buddhists,
Parsis and Jews. - Minorities on both sides fled their homes and often secured temporary shelter in ‘refugee
camps’, where lakhs lived for months and sometimes for years, and where they found
unhelpful local administration and police in what was till recently their own country. - Thousands of women were abducted, made to convert to the religion of the abductor and
forced into marriage; in many cases women were killed by their own family members to preserve
the ‘family honour’. Many children were separated from their parents. - The east had a second consequence the exercises test: what was ‘East’ Bengal has now
become Bangladesh, which is why our Bengal is called ‘West’ Bengal.
The chapter’s ‘Let’s re-search’ box tells of Shweta’s Nana, who moved from Lahore to
Ludhiana during partition. Both his parents were killed, and he would not have survived
either, but a neighbouring Muslim family gave him shelter and kept him in hiding for several
days, then helped him find relatives so that he could cross the border and start a new life. The
chapter adds that there are many examples of Hindu families and others who helped, sheltered and
saved the lives of Muslim families during the same crisis, and draws the point out for you: it
shows the importance of compassion and solidarity on religious grounds in both communities. Use
this if a question asks you to look at Partition as more than a story of violence.
Faiz Ahmed Faiz (1911-1984). Born in Sialkot; stayed in Pakistan after partition; a
leftist who opposed the Pakistani regime and was imprisoned. Collections: Naksh-e-Fariyadi,
Dast-e-Saba, Zindan-Nama. The chapter prints ‘The Dawn of Freedom’, translated from
his Urdu poem Subh-e-azadi.
Amrita Pritam (1919-2005). A prominent Punjabi poet and fiction writer; Sahitya Akademi
Award, Padma Shree and Jnanapeeth Award; after partition she made Delhi her second home and edited
the Punjabi monthly Nagmani. The chapter prints ‘Today I call Waris Shah’, translated from
her Punjabi poem Aaj Akhan Waris Shah Nun.
Saadat Hasan Manto. The chapter prints ‘Hospitality Delayed’, translated from his Urdu
short story Kasre-Nafsi, in which rioters halt a train, people of the other community are
pulled out and slaughtered, and the remaining passengers are then treated to halwa, fruits and
milk.
Garam Hawa (1973). Director M.S. Sathyu; screenplay Kaifi Azmi; actors Balraj Sahani,
Jalal Aga, Farouque Sheikh, Gita Siddharth. Salim Mirza, a shoe manufacturer in Agra, finds himself
a stranger among the people he has lived with all his life; his son Sikandar joins a students’
procession demanding fair treatment from the government.
5 Gandhi After Independence
in Kolkata, in the areas torn by gruesome riots between Hindus and Muslims, disheartened that
ahimsa (non-violence) and satyagraha (active but non-violent resistance) had failed
to bind the people.
celebrated in a spirit of communal harmony, with joyous dancing in the streets. When riots erupt
again he resorts to a fast to bring peace. The chapter’s photograph from the same year shows him
in Noakhali, now in Bangladesh.
concerned that Muslims should be allowed to stay in India with dignity, as equal citizens, and
unhappy at the government’s decision not to honour its financial commitments to Pakistan.
and violence reduce, Muslims of Delhi and surrounding areas return safely home, and the
government of India agrees to give Pakistan its dues.
prayer in Delhi and fires three bullets at him, killing him instantly.
6 Integration of the Princely States
- Princely States covered one-third of the land area of the British Indian Empire, and
one out of four Indians lived under princely rule. - Paramountcy would lapse, so all 565 states would become legally independent.
- They were free to join India or Pakistan or remain independent, and the decision was left
not to the people but to the princely rulers. - The ruler of Travancore announced independence first; the Nizam of Hyderabad
did the same the next day; the Nawab of Bhopal was averse to joining the Constituent
Assembly. - In most princely states, governments were run in a non-democratic manner and the rulers were
unwilling to give democratic rights to their populations.
One. The people of most of the princely states clearly wanted to become part of the
Indian union.
Two. The government was prepared to be flexible in giving autonomy to some regions, so as
to accommodate plurality and deal with the demands of the regions flexibly.
Three. In the backdrop of partition, which brought into focus the contest over
demarcation of territory, the integration and consolidation of the territorial boundaries of the
nation had assumed supreme importance.
Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel (1875-1950). Leader of the freedom movement; Congress leader;
follower of Mahatma Gandhi; Deputy Prime Minister and first Home Minister of independent
India; member of the Constituent Assembly committees on Fundamental Rights, Minorities and
Provincial Constitution. Under the Mountbatten Plan the Princely states were free to join
India or Pakistan, and he negotiated with their rulers firmly but diplomatically.
How complicated it was: there were 26 small states in today’s Orissa, and the
Saurashtra region of Gujarat had 14 big states, 119 small states and numerous other
different administrations.
| The four difficult accessions | How it was settled |
|---|---|
| Junagadh | A plebiscite confirmed people’s desire to join India |
| Hyderabad | Standstill Agreement, November 1947; then army action in September 1948 and the Nizam’s surrender |
| Kashmir | Taken up separately by the book in Chapter Seven |
| Manipur | Instrument of Accession before Independence; Merger Agreement, September 1949 |
Mysore and Gwalior appear only in NCERT Exercise 3, which asks you to mark four
princely states on a current political map of India. The other two in that list are Junagadh and
Manipur. Neither Mysore nor Gwalior is among the four states whose accession the chapter calls more
difficult than the rest.
Hyderabad
The largest of the Princely States, surrounded entirely by Indian territory; parts of the old
Hyderabad state are today in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. Its ruler carried the
title ‘Nizam’ and was one of the world’s richest men. A movement of the people against his rule
gathered force: the peasantry in the Telangana region in particular was the victim of his
oppressive rule and rose against him, and women who had seen the worst of this oppression joined in
large numbers. Hyderabad town was the nerve centre, and the Communists and the Hyderabad
Congress were in the forefront. The Nizam replied with the Razakars. The central government had
to order the army; in September 1948 it moved in, and after a few days of intermittent
fighting the Nizam surrendered.
Manipur
A few days before Independence the Maharaja, Bodhachandra Singh, signed the Instrument of
Accession on the assurance that Manipur’s internal autonomy would be maintained. Under the pressure
of public opinion he held elections in June 1948 and the state became a constitutional
monarchy, which made Manipur the first part of India to hold an election based on universal adult
franchise. In the Legislative Assembly there were sharp differences over merger: the state Congress
wanted it, other political parties were opposed. The Government of India persuaded the Maharaja into
signing a Merger Agreement in September 1949.
7 Reorganisation of States
The argument for postponing
- Carving out states on the basis of language might lead to disruption and
disintegration - It would draw attention away from other social and economic challenges
- The fate of the Princely States had not yet been decided
- The memory of partition was still fresh
The argument that won
- The national movement had rejected colonial boundaries as artificial and promised the
linguistic principle - Accepting regional and linguistic claims would reduce the threat of division and
separatism - Accommodating regional demands was seen as more democratic
- Popular pressure: people agitated even against very popular leaders
principle as the basis of reorganising the party itself; Provincial Congress Committees are
created by linguistic zones.
state of Andhra.
violent outbursts follow in the Andhra region; many are injured or lose their lives in police
firing, and several legislators in Madras resign their seats.
state.
Reorganisation Commission.
union territories.
Gandhian worker; left a government job to participate in the Salt Satyagraha; also participated
in individual Satyagraha; went on a fast in 1946 demanding that temples in Madras province be
opened to dalits; undertook a fast unto death from 19 October 1952 demanding a separate state of
Andhra; died during the fast on 15 December 1952.
The old Madras province from which Andhra was carved included present day Tamil Nadu and
parts of Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Karnataka.
CBSE asks cartoon-based questions, and this chapter carries two by Shankar, both about
the same anxiety.
“Struggle for Survival” (26 July 1953) captures a contemporary impression of the demand
for linguistic states, drawn in the months right after Andhra was announced.
“Coaxing the Genie back” (5 February 1956) asked whether the States Reorganisation
Commission could contain the genie of linguism, that is, whether the demand it had recognised could
still be controlled. A third cartoon, by R.K. Laxman in the Times of India, comments
on the relation between the people and the rulers in the Princely States, and on Patel’s approach
to resolving this issue.
8 What Linguistic States Did
- The path to politics and power was now open to people other than the small English speaking
elite. - Linguistic reorganisation gave some uniform basis to the drawing of state boundaries.
- It did not lead to disintegration as many had feared; on the contrary it strengthened
national unity. - Above all, it underlined the acceptance of the principle of diversity: democracy came to be
associated with plurality of ideas and ways of life, and much of the politics in the later
period took place within this framework.
9 Fast Forward: Creation of New States
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1960 | After a popular agitation, the bilingual Bombay state of Gujarati- and Marathi-speaking people is split into Maharashtra and Gujarat |
| 1963 | Nagaland becomes a state |
| 1966 | Statehood for Punjab, ten years after the other states, when the territories of today’s Haryana and Himachal Pradesh are separated from the larger Punjab state. Punjab had two linguistic groups, Hindi-speaking and Punjabi-speaking |
| 1972 | Meghalaya is carved out of Assam; Manipur and Tripura emerge as separate states in the same year |
| 1987 | Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh come into being |
| 2000 | Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand and Jharkhand, created on the basis of a separate regional culture or complaints of regional imbalance in development rather than language |
| 2 June 2014 | Telangana emerges as a new state |
| Still pending | Movements for separate and smaller states in Vidarbha in Maharashtra, Harit Pradesh in the western region of Uttar Pradesh, and the northern region of West Bengal |
10 Every Date in One Place
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 1920 | Nagpur session of Congress; linguistic principle adopted for the party |
| 11 August 1947 | Jinnah’s Presidential Address to the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan at Karachi |
| 14 August 1947 | Gandhi in Kolkata: a day of rejoicing as well as of mourning |
| 14-15 August 1947 | India attains independence at midnight; Nehru’s ‘tryst with destiny’ speech; two nation-states come into existence |
| 15 October 1947 | Nehru’s Letter to Chief Ministers on the Muslim minority |
| November 1947 | The Nizam signs the Standstill Agreement with India |
| January 1948 | Gandhi’s last fast; his statement on linguistic provinces |
| 30 January 1948 | Gandhi is assassinated by Nathuram Vinayak Godse |
| June 1948 | Elections in Manipur; the state becomes a constitutional monarchy |
| September 1948 | The Indian army moves into Hyderabad; the Nizam surrenders |
| September 1949 | The Maharaja of Manipur signs the Merger Agreement |
| 26 January 1950 | The first republic day, marked by three stamps issued in 1950 |
| 1951 | Muslim population 10-12 per cent of the total population |
| 19 October 1952 | Potti Sriramulu begins his fast unto death |
| 15 December 1952 | Potti Sriramulu dies, after 56 days |
| December 1952 | A separate Andhra state is announced |
| 1953 | The States Reorganisation Commission is appointed |
| 1956 | The States Reorganisation Act: 14 states and six union territories |
| 1960 to 2014 | Maharashtra and Gujarat, Nagaland, Punjab, the north-east, Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand, Jharkhand and Telangana |
11 Lines Worth Carrying In
Mahatma Gandhi, 14 August 1947, Kolkata: “Tomorrow we shall be free from the slavery of the
British domination. But at midnight India will be partitioned. Tomorrow will thus be a day of
rejoicing as well as of mourning.”
Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Karachi, 11 August 1947: “You are free; you are free to go to your temples,
you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place of worship in this State of Pakistan.”
Jawaharlal Nehru, Letter to Chief Ministers, 15 October 1947: “We have a Muslim minority who are
so large in numbers that they cannot, even if they want, go anywhere else.” And the warning that
follows it: “If we fail to do so, we shall have a festering sore which will eventually poison the
whole body politic and probably destroy it.”
Sardar Patel, Letter to Princely rulers, 1947: “We are at a momentous stage in the history of
India. By common endeavour, we can raise the country to new greatness, while lack of unity will
expose us to unexpected calamities.”
Mahatma Gandhi, January 1948, on linguistic provinces: “It would be absurd to make Hindustani
the medium of instruction in all the regions and it is still more absurd to use English for this
purpose.”
Ramachandra Guha, quoted in the exercises: “In the history of nation-building only the Soviet
experiment bears comparison with the Indian.”
‘Imagined community’. Exercise 9 says the nation is to a large extent an ‘imagined
community’ held together by common beliefs, history, political aspirations and imaginations, and
asks you to identify the features that make India a nation. Answer with four: a shared history and
common destiny; a common political aspiration written into the Constitution; secularism as a shared
civic identity; and the acceptance of diversity as the basis of unity.
The Soviet comparison. Exercise 10 gives a passage by Ramachandra Guha saying that
in the history of nation-building only the Soviet experiment bears comparison with the Indian,
because there too a sense of unity had to be forged between diverse ethnic groups, religious and
linguistic communities and social classes, on a comparably massive scale, with a people divided by
faith and driven by debt and disease.
All three parts of this chapter are the same question asked three times. Partition asked whether
a country could be held together across religion; the princely states asked whether it could be
held together across five hundred separate rulers; the linguistic states asked whether it could be
held together across languages. The answer India gave each time was the same: not by suppressing
the difference, but by giving it a place inside the nation. That is why the chapter ends by saying
that linguistic reorganisation strengthened national unity instead of destroying it.
12 CBSE 2026-27 Reference Material: Patel and National Integration
Status: the CBSE 2026-27 curriculum lists this as additional reference material. Its annexure says this material is “for classroom transaction and will not be assessed in the Board examination”. Read it for understanding; it is not part of the NCERT book.
- Emerged as a major freedom-movement leader after the Kheda Satyagraha (1918) and the Bardoli Satyagraha (1928).
- Undertook uniting all 565 princely states; the ‘Iron Man’ of India, no compromise on territorial integrity.
- Key challenges: Hyderabad, Junagadh, Kashmir; Indian forces compelled Hyderabad and Junagadh to merge.
- Wanted Kashmir integrated like Hyderabad, but could not integrate it fully.
- Characterised as ‘Nationalist’, ‘Catalyst’, ‘Realist’ (NCR).