• Capt. Praveen Davar

On Sep 2, 1946, eleven months before independence, the Viceroy Lord Wavell announced the formation of an Interim Government with Jawaharlal Nehru as the Vice-president of the Executive Council (the Viceroy himself being the President). Sardar Patel was allocated the Home portfolio along with Information and Broadcasting. A fortnight before Independence, on August 1, 1947, Pt. Nehru, the Prime Minister designate wrote to Sardar Patel formally inviting him to join his Cabinet: “The writing is superfluous because you are the strongest pillar of the Cabinet.”

Patel wrote back:

‘My service will be at your disposal, I hope for the rest of my life and you will have unquestioned loyalty and devotion from me in the cause for which no man in India has sacrificed as much as you have done. Our combination is unbreakable and therein lies our strength.’

Sardar Patel became India’s first Deputy Prime Minister and was allocated, besides the Home and Information & Broadcasting, portfolio of States, dealing with the Princely States that were outside the domain of British India before independence. Soon began the vital task of consolidating India’s newly won freedom. He integrated 562 princely states within the Indian Union with tact, vision and statesmanship. According to former Prime Minister Morarji Desai, “The integration of the states could be termed as the crowning achievement of Vallabhbhai Patel’s life.” But for him, this may not have been achieved easily and quickly.

These States were littered all over India. They varied in size from a State of the size of France to a State of about four square miles. The fate of 86 million people was at stake. The States had been nursed by the British Government to serve as bulwarks against the political unrest spreading to the rest of India and had become bastions of reaction and autocracy.

With the exception of a very few States, there was not even a semblance of democracy in them. Autocratic rule prevailed everywhere. The personal will of the ruler was the law of the land. The system of responsible government in the adjacent provinces had made autocracy anarchronistic. Despite the ruthless hand of the rulers, the people had become so clamorous that they were prepared to take the law into their own hands. In some of the States, trouble had already broken out; in others it was merely a matter of time. Sardar Patel wanted to stem this tide of turmoil and disorder. He was keen on effecting a peaceful revolution.

He found a very powerful ally in Lord Mountbatten, whose personal prestige and tactful handling of the leading rulers tilted the scales. The Viceroy warned the rulers of the perils of independent existence. A link-up with either Dominion could alone give them stability. In making their choice of the Dominion they also could not resist the compulsions of geography and the will of the people. He used his persuasive powers at full blast to blow away the hesitations of some of the important Princes.

Patel organized the States Department on July 5, and selected V.P. Menon, an officer of outstanding ability and experience, to be its Secretary. India owes a debt of gratitude to Menon and his officers for the manner in which they carried out Sardar’s policy and instructions against heavy odds. They showed skill in handling the rulers, disarming their suspicions, appealing to them in the name of patriotism as well as of self-interest and finally pushing them into signing the required agreements. Their immediate object was to secure the accession of the States to India in matters which the States could not handle by themselves, namely, defence, foreign affairs and communications, and to secure Standstill Agreements to continue the existing agreements of common interest. The States Department had to work in an atmosphere of hostility of the Muslim League. Jinnah was opposed to the accession of the States and tried his best to lure some of the border States into signing agreements with Pakistan. A typical case was that of the Maharaja of Jodhpur and the Maharaj Kumar of Jaisalmer who were invited by Jinnah. During the negotiations, Jinnah signed a blank sheet of paper and gave it to the Maharaja of Jodhpur saying, ‘You can fill in all your conditions’. The Maharaja was tempted and turned to the Maharaj Kumar, who said to Jinnah: If there is any dispute between Hindus and Muslims in my States I will not side with Muslims against Hindus’. The spell was broken, Jinnah was left without an answer. The rulers returned to their States to find that their feudatories and nobles were violently opposed to any agreement with Pakistan from where Hindus were fleeing in terror. A few days later, the Maharaja of Jodhpur met Lord Mountbatten, who warned him that his accession to Pakistan would be in conflict with the policy underlying the partition of the country and that he might have to face serious riots within his State. The writing on the wall could not be ignored with impunity. Reluctantly, the Maharaja acceded to India and thus followed the lead given by the Maharajas of Patiala, Gwalior, Baroda and Bikaner.
The Nawab of Bhopal had been nursing a plan to forming a Third Force of the rulers who wanted to remain independent. He wanted to enter into treaty relations with both Dominions. However, by the first week of August he realized that most of the rulers, on whom he had relied, had already acceded to India and he could no longer fight against the flood of accessions. He gave up his dream of separate existence and acceded to India.

The real difficulty in integration was faced only with regard to the State of Jammu and Kashmir, Hyderabad and Junagadh. On November 9, 1947,India took over Junagadh, and in a plebiscite held in February 1948 the people supported the accession to India by 190,779 votes against 91. The Indian army marched into Hyderabad on September13, 1948. As Jinnah had died only the day before, the British Commander-in Chief requested Patel to postpone the operation, but he was overruled. The integration of Jammu and Kashmir took a much longer time due to Pakistan sponsored tribal invasion of the State which resulted in the first Indo-Pak War that ended only with the New Year Day in 1949.

Sardar Patel had reason to be gratified that he had laid the foundations of an integrated India, wherein regional loyalties had been overshadowed by the desire to build a strong and united nation. By partition, India had lost 3.6 lakh square miles of territory with a population of 81.5 million. By the integration of States, she acquired 5 lakh square miles of territory with a population of 86.5 million. Artificial barriers between the States and the rest of India were demolished. Almost overnight the superstructure of the modern system of Government was introduced in these States.

But the contribution of Lord Mountbatten and Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru cannot be underestimated as also of V.P. Menon, the Secretary of the States Department. Sandeep Bamzai writes in his book Princestan-How Nehru, Patel and Mountbatten made India: “Nehru was the progenitor of the idea of breaking the back of the princes, his visceral hatred for them shaped by Fabian Socialism and a brutal jail stint in Nabha in the early 1920s. He was the man who saw tomorrow... and strengthening the people’s movements in the states. Mountbatten was the centrifugal force which dismantled not just the Empire but, eventually, the venerable princelings... The third member of this Holy Trinity in the coordinated relay run was the Sardar. Patel, an administrator par excellence, was tough, unrelenting and unyielding. He completed the task imagined and envisioned by Nehru and overseen with great sagacity by Mountbatten... And finally, there was Menon; the man who proved indefatigable and relentless in his pursuit of closure, as he hunted down each prey with calculating efficiency.”

The ‘Iron Man of India’ died in Bombay (now Mumbai) on Dec 15, 1950 after a prolonged illness. Before rushing to Bombay to attend the Sardar’s cremation, Pt. Nehru spoke in Parliament: “ ‘.... He will be remembered as a great captain of our forces in the struggle for freedom and as one who gave us sound advice in times of trouble and in moments of victory, as a friend and a colleague on whom one could invariably rely, as a tower of strength which revived wavering hearts.’

The writer is former Secretary, AICC