Test: Class 12 Politics In India Since Independence NCERT Based-1 - UPSC MCQ

The interim government took a firm stance against the possible division of India into small principalities of different sizes. The Muslim League opposed the Indian National Congress and took the view that the States should be free to adopt any course they liked.

Sardar Patel was India’s Deputy Prime Minister and the Home Minister during the crucial period immediately following Independence. He played a historic role in negotiating with the rulers of princely states firmly but diplomatically and bringing most of them into the Indian Union. It may look easy now.

But it was a very complicated task which required skilful persuasion. For instance, there were 26 small states in today’s Orissa. Saurashtra region of Gujarat had 14 big states, 119 small states and numerous other different administrations.

Before 15 August 1947, peaceful negotiations had brought almost all states whose territories were contiguous to the new boundaries of India, into the Indian Union.

The rulers of most of the states signed a document called the ‘Instrument of Accession’ which meant that their state agreed to become a part of the Union of India. Accession of the Princely States of Junagadh, Hyderabad, Kashmir and Manipur proved more difficult than the rest.

The issue of Junagarh was resolved after a plebiscite confirmed people’s desire to join India. You will read about Kashmir in Chapter Eight. Here, let us look at the cases of Hyderabad and Manipur.

Hyderabad, the largest of the Princely States was surrounded entirely by Indian territory. Some parts of the old Hyderabad state are today parts of Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. Its ruler carried the title, ‘Nizam’, and he was one of the world’s richest men.

The Nizam wanted an independent status for Hyderabad. He entered into what was called the Standstill Agreement with India in November 1947 for a year while negotiations with the Indian government were going on.

Constitution was adopted on 26 November 1949 and signed on 24 January 1950 and it came into effect on 26 January 1950. At that time the country was being ruled by an interim government.

It was now necessary to install the first democratically elected government of the country. The Constitution had laid down the rules, now the machine had to be put in place. Initially it was thought that this was only a matter of a few months. The Election Commission of India was set up in January 1950.

Sukumar Sen became the first Chief Election Commissioner. The country’s first general elections were expected sometime in 1950 itself.

It means both are Correct. A look at the electoral map would give you a sense of the dominance of the Congress during the period 1952-1962.

In the second and the third general elections, held in 1957 and 1962 respectively, the Congress maintained the same position in the Lok Sabha by winning three-fourth of the seats. None of the opposition parties could win even one-tenth of the number of seats won by the Congress. In the state assembly elections, the Congress did not get a majority in a few cases. The most significant of these cases was in Kerala in 1957.

Another important feature of the politics after the 1967 election was the role played by defections in the making and unmaking of governments in the States.

Defection means an elected representative leaves the party on whose symbol he/she was elected and joins another party. After the 1967 general election, the breakaway Congress legislators played an important role in installing non-Congress governments in three States - Haryana, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.

The constant realignments and shifting political loyalties in this period gave rise to the expression ‘Aya Ram, Gaya Ram’. The story of ‘Aya Ram, Gaya Ram’: The expression ‘aya ram, gaya ram’ became popular in the political vocabulary in India to describe the practice of frequent floor-crossing by legislators. Literally translated the terms meant, Ram came and Ram went.

The National Coordination Committee for Railwaymen’s Struggle led by George Fernandes gave a call for nationwide strike by all employees of the Railways for pressing their demands related to bonus and service conditions. The government was opposed to these demands. So, the employees of India’s largest public sector undertaking went on a strike in May 1974.

The strike by the Railway employees added to the atmosphere of labour unrest. It also raised issues like rights of the workers and whether employees of essential services should adopt measures like strikes. The government declared the strike illegal. As the government refused to concede the demands of the striking workers, arrested many of their leaders and deployed the Territorial Army to protect railway tracks, the strike had to be called off after twenty days without any settlement.

The government made extensive use of preventive detention. Under this provision, people are arrested and detained not because they have committed any offence, but on the apprehension that they may commit an offence.

Using preventive detention acts, the government made large scale arrests during the emergency. Arrested political workers could not challenge their arrest through habeas corpus petitions. Many cases were filed in the High Courts and the Supreme Court by and on behalf of arrested persons, but the government claimed that it was not even necessary to inform the arrested persons of the reasons and grounds of their arrest. Several High Courts gave judgments that even after the declaration of emergency the courts could entertain a writ of habeas corpus filed by a person challenging his/her detention.

In April 1976, the constitution bench of the Supreme Court overruled the High Courts and accepted the government’s plea. It meant that during an emergency the government could take away the citizen’s right to life and liberty. This judgment closed the doors of judiciary for the citizens and is regarded as one of the most controversial judgments of the Supreme Court.

Shah Commission of Inquiry In May 1977, the Janata Party government appointed a Commission of Inquiry headed by Justice J.C. Shah, retired Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of India, to inquire “into several aspects of allegations of abuse of authority, excesses and malpractices committed and action taken in the wake of the Emergency proclaimed on the 25th June, 1975”.

The Commission examined various kinds of evidence and called scores of witnesses to give testimonies. These included Indira Gandhi who appeared before the Commission but refused to answer any questions.

In an indirect manner the issue of welfare of the backward castes also began to dominate politics since 1977. As we saw above, the results of 1977 elections were at least partly due to a shift among the backward castes of north India.

Following the Lok Sabha elections, many states also held Assembly elections in 1977. Again, the northern States elected non-Congress governments in which the leaders of the backward castes played an important role.

The issue of reservations for ‘other backward classes’ became very controversial in Bihar and following this, the Mandal Commission was appointed by the Janata party government at the centre. You will read more about this and about the role of the politics of backward castes, in the last chapter. The elections after the emergency set off the process of this change in the party system.