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From: honavar@uwai.UUCP (Vasant Honavar)
Newsgroups: net.nlang.india
Subject: Re: Mountbatten's role in India
Message-ID: <350@uwai.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 13-Feb-86 03:10:24 EST
Article-I.D.: uwai.350
Posted: Thu Feb 13 03:10:24 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 14-Feb-86 06:35:03 EST
Organization: U of Wisconsin CS Dept
Lines: 103
Summary: What is wrong with the concept of independent states.

(Long -  100 lines)
References: <687@harvard.UUCP> <802@brl-smoke.ARPA>

In article <802@brl-smoke.ARPA>, wmartin@brl-smoke.ARPA (Will Martin ) writes:
> There is still one aspect that has
> been nagging at me while I watch it: the continued strong feelings
> against subdividing India into independent states. This is being
> portrayed as being so strong as to be "revulsion" or "hate" against the
> very concept.
	
	The answer to your question is contained in the question itself.
	A vast majority of Indians who participated in the struggle for
	independence did so to gain independence for a united India, not
	for a bunch of princely states that were being run by rulers at the
	beck and call of their imperialist masters. For these people who
	made great sacrifices to make their dream of independent India a
	reality, and to a great extent, to the present generation of Indians,
	the division of India to appease the greed of a manipulative 
	politician who demanded seperation of India on religious grounds
	can be likened to severing a part of their bodies. Is there a man
	or woman who does not feel revulsion or hatred against the concept
	of cutting off a person's limbs ?
> 
> Maybe I'm totally wrong, but it was my understanding that what is now
> India WAS a large number of separate and independent states before
> the British forced it together by military force. What would be so wrong
> with self-determination, and allowing those states to resume their
> former independence? Why should India be a single large country, forcing
> together many disparate language and ethnic groups, if they would prefer
> to be independent individual countries? I can certainly see that a
> politician would prefer to have power over a large country, instead of
> being the leader of a smaller state, but, speaking in simple moral
> terms, it appears that the principle of self-determination should
> outweigh such desires, and that any area in which the inhabitants wished
> to be independent should have been allowed to follow that path. After
> all, if these states later determined that they were not self-sufficient
> or that independent government was too much of a burden to continue,
> they always could have decided to merge later on. This seems the path of
> greatest freedom and true democracy. What was wrong with this concept?
> 
	Even a casual study of the the history of India would be sufficient
	to convince one of the fallacy of this argument. There have been 
	periods in Indian history when almost the entire territory of the
	Indian subcontinent was under one government. Granted, these 
	governments were not democratic although some of them allowed
	limited local self government. The British entered India for
	ostensibly for trade at a time when the country was week and 
	was strife-torn - a situation caused by both lack of leadership
	and the greed of the princes. The East India Company utilised
	every opprtunity to play off one princely ruler against another
	(it is a shame that the Indians let it happen) and in the process
	managed to establish control over all of India.

	Self determination? For whom? The greedy princes who served the
	British interests and who would have prefered to have their little
	dominions back to rule as they pleased? That is not what the freedom
	fighters had in mind. They wanted a united, democratic India.	
	What they managed to attain was a divided (India and Pakistan) India
	of which India has remained a democracy since independence.

	I presume the reference to "a single large country" is a reference to
	the present India. It is a fallacy propagated by sections of the 
	western press - the same people who speculated on "how long India
	could survive its independence" that the disparate ethnic and 
	linguistic groups want independent countries. Of course, there are
	small groups of people, who, motivated by their selfish greed,
	spurred on by sympathetic external forces make their desire for
	"independence" known in various forms. It is to be expected that
	in a country as large and as diverse as India, there would be social
	and economic tensions. Name one country in the world that is free 
	from these problems in some form or another. But the federal system
	that India has adopted, provides appropriate channels for the
	expression of peoples aspirations. It is not a perfect system but
	it has worked for thirty odd years since independence. It is worth
	noting that often the political parties that rule in the states and
	at the national level are different, elected based on different issues.

	It certainly is not hard to see the "moral principles" involved in 
	promoting the idea of dividing India into several independent 
	countries. Apart from the fact that the majority of the Indians
	did not desire it, it is quite obvious what havoc such an action
	would have unleashed on the Indian subcontinent. It would have,
	much to the delight of the prophets of doom, plunged the subcontinent
	into anarchy opening up opportunities for manipulative politics
	by the superpowers at a scale much larger than that permitted by
	the current political climate of the region, making India a happy
	playground for warring superpowers to flex their muscles against 
	eachother at the expense of India (Latin America and Africa
	and even South east Asia more than provide adequate existantial 
	proof of this statement). 

	What is wrong with the concept of dividing India up into a number
	of "independent, individual countries" to realise "true freedom
	and democracy"? Just the fact that it is not the brand of freedom 
	and democracy that the majority of people in India desire. India
	finds strength in unity amidst diversity.

	Sorry for the rather long reply. I could not otherwise have addressed
	all the points raised by Will Martins.


					-- Vasant Honavar
					honavar@ai.wisc.edu