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Sardar Patel: Letter To Princely Rulers, 1947

This document discusses the challenges faced by India's leaders after independence in establishing a democratic and united nation. It notes that while many newly independent countries opted for non-democratic rule in the interest of national unity, India's leaders chose to take the more difficult path of democracy. It highlights how the first general election in India in 1952 proved critics wrong by successfully conducting democratic elections even in conditions of poverty and illiteracy, establishing that democracy could work anywhere.

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53 views

Sardar Patel: Letter To Princely Rulers, 1947

This document discusses the challenges faced by India's leaders after independence in establishing a democratic and united nation. It notes that while many newly independent countries opted for non-democratic rule in the interest of national unity, India's leaders chose to take the more difficult path of democracy. It highlights how the first general election in India in 1952 proved critics wrong by successfully conducting democratic elections even in conditions of poverty and illiteracy, establishing that democracy could work anywhere.

Uploaded by

sarora_us
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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We begin by looking at the events that formed the

context of Independence. This can help us understand why the


issue of national unity and

A democratic constitution is necessary but not sufficient for


establishing a democracy.

The first
and the immediate challenge was to shape a nation that was united,
yet accommodative of the diversity in our society. India was a land
of continental size and diversity.

first challenge of nationbuilding


that occupied centre-stage in the years immediately after
Independence.

We begin by looking at the events that formed the


context of Independence.This can help us understand why the
issue of national unity and security became a primary challenge
at the time of Independence.

the Indian Independence was aimed at unity,


self-determination as well as democracy.

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. I
hope the Indian States will
realise fully that if we do
not cooperate and work
together in the general
interest, anarchy and chaos
will overwhelm us all, great
and small, and lead us to
total ruin...
Sardar Patel
Letter to Princely rulers,
1947.

Faced with such serious challenges, leaders in many other


countries of the world decided that their country could not afford
to have democracy. They said that national unity was their first
priority and that democracy will introduce differences and conflicts.
Therefore many of the countries that gained freedom from colonialism
experienced non-democratic rule. It took various forms: nominal
democracy but effective control by one leader, one party rule or direct
army rule. Non-democratic regimes always started with a promise of
restoring democracy very soon. But once they established themselves,
it was very difficult to dislodge them.
The conditions in India were not very different. But the leaders of
the newly independent India decided to take the more difficult path.
Any other path would have been surprising, for our freedom struggle
was deeply committed to the idea of democracy. Our leaders were
conscious of the critical role of politics in any democracy. They did not
see politics as a problem; they saw it as a way of solving the problems.
Every society needs to decide how it will govern and regulate itself.
There are always different policy alternatives to choose from. There
are different groups with different and conflicting aspirations. How
do we resolve these differences? Democratic politics is an answer to
this question. While competition and power are the two most visible
things about politics, the purpose of political activity is and should be
deciding and pursuing public interest. This is the route our leaders
decided to take.

It is said that the nation is to a large extent an “ imagined community”


held together by common beliefs, history, political aspirations and
imaginations. Identify the features that make India a nation.

“In the history of nation-building only the Soviet experiment bears


comparison with the Indian. There too, a sense of unity had to be forged
between many diverse ethnic groups, religious, linguistic communities
and social classes. The scale – geographic as well as demographic
– was comparably massive. The raw material the state had to work with
was equally unpropitious: a people divided by faith and driven by debt
and disease.” — RAMACHANDRA GUHA

In India,….
…hero-worship, plays a part
in its politics unequalled
in magnitude by the part
it plays in the politics of
any other country….But in
politics, .. ..hero-worship is a
sure road to degradation and
eventual dictatorship.
Dr. Babasaheb
Ambedkar
Speech in Constituent
Assembly
25 November 1949

It is impossible not to be astonished by India. Nowhere on earth does humanity present itself in such
a dizzying, beliefs, creative burst of cultures and religions, races and tongues festivals, colours, spirit
to fight, love and respect. India has a rich and unique cultural heritage, and has managed to preserve
its established traditions throughout history whilst absorbing customs, traditions and ideas from
both invaders and immigrants. Many cultural practices, languages, customs and monuments are
examples of this co-mingling over centuries.

What’s so special
about our being a
democracy? Sooner
or later every country
has become a
democracy, isn’t it?
It was not just the size of the country and the electorate that made
this election unusual. The first general election was also the first big
test of democracy in a poor and illiterate country. Till then democracy
had existed only in the prosperous countries, mainly in Europe and
North America, where nearly everyone was literate. By that time
many countries in Europe had not given voting rights to all women.
In this context India’s experiment with universal adult franchise
appeared very bold and risky. An Indian editor called it “the
biggest gamble in history”. Organiser, a magazine, wrote
that Jawaharlal Nehru “would live to confess the failure
of universal adult franchise in India”. A British member of
the Indian Civil Service claimed that “a future and more
enlightened age will view with astonishment the absurd farce
of recording the votes of millions of illiterate people”.
The Indian experiment had proved the critics wrong. The
Times of India held that the polls have “confounded all those
sceptics who thought the introduction of adult franchise
too risky an experiment in this country”. The Hindustan
Times claimed that “there is universal agreement that the
Indian people have conducted themselves admirably in the
largest experiment in democratic elections in the history of
the world”. Observers outside India were equally impressed.
India’s general election of 1952 became a landmark in the
history of democracy all over the world. It was no longer
possible to argue that democratic elections could not be held
in conditions of poverty or lack of education. It proved that
democracy could be practiced anywhere in the world.

We were struck by the fact that over the years we have followed policies of
fragmenting our educational enterprise into cubicles. We have overlooked
that new knowledge and new insights have often originated at the
boundaries of disciplines. We have tended to imprison disciplinary studies in
opaque walls. This has restricted flights of imagination and limited our
creativity. This character of our education classrooms has restrained and restricted our
young right from the school age and continues that way into college and
university stages. Most instrumentalities of our education harm the potential
of human mind for constructing and creating new knowledge. We have
emphasized delivery of information and rewarded capability of storing
information. This does not help in creating a knowledge society. This is
particularly vile at the university level because one of the requirements of a
good university should be to engage in knowledge creation – not just for the
learner but also for society as a whole.
(Report of ‘The Committee to Advise on Renovation and Rejuvenation of Higher Education’)

Our report comes at a time when there is a refreshing


seriousness about doing some thing ambitious and unprecedented in our
higher education. A large number of Central universities are being set up.
Also several Institutes of Technology, Management and other areas. During a
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lot of discussion in this regard we have also talked of World-Class
Universities. We would like to point out that there are no great universities
in the world that do not simultaneously conduct world class programs in
science, astronomy, management, languages, comparative literature,
philosophy, psychology, information technology, law, political science,
economics, agriculture and many other emerging disciplines. Indeed the
emerging disciplines do their emerging because of infection or triggering by
other fields in the same university. That is the reason that such universities
are so great and our academics keep going to them. Our argument is that
they would not be great if they could not accommodate people from many
other disciplines. Put together, all the disciplines, breed value into each
other. If forced to stay in isolation from each other they would not have the
character demanded for greatness. It is our strong recommendation that the
new Universities, including those we call Indian Institutes of Technology – or
Management should have the character of such world-class universities.
Furthermore, the existing Institutes of Technology whose competence as
excellent undergraduate institutions we do recognize (also their brand name)
should be challenged to play a bigger role – for example similar to that of
great universities like the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) or
Caltech. In addition, like these great universities of the world they should
engage with a much wider universe of knowledge, both at undergraduate
and post graduate levels.

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