Indian Politics and Society since Independence

Events, Processes and Ideology

Bidyut Chakrabarty

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2008
• ISBN:
  9781134132683
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politica e relazioni internazionali
• Subtopic: Politica

Focusing on politics and society in India, this book explores new areas enmeshed in the complex social, economic and political processes in the country. Linking the structural characteristics with the broader sociological context, the book emphasizes the strong influence of sociological issues on politics, such as social milieu shaping and the articulation of the political in day-to-day events. Political events are connected with the ever-changing social, economic and political processes in order to provide an analytical framework to explain 'peculiarities' of Indian politics. Bidyut Chakrabarty argues that three major ideological influences of colonialism, nationalism and democracy have provided the foundational values of Indian politics.

Structured thematically and chronologically, this work is a useful resource for students of political science, sociology and South Asian studies.

1 Setting the scene

Partition and after

The 1947 partition set the perspective in which India rose as a free nation. The Constitution that was adopted in 1950 was the product of two conflicting cultures: one representing the national leaders’ normative concern for India’s multicultural personality, shaped by her unique history and geography; and the other underlining their concern for unity, security and administrative efficiency. The former led to the articulation of secularism and federalism in the 1950 Constitution and the latter resulted in the retention of the very state machinery that had consolidated the colonial rule in India. The net result was the emergence of a semi-hegemonic state that drew largely upon the 1935 Government of India Act. If the new Indian political elites received a legacy of government from their predecessors, they assuredly carried over also, argued W. H. Morris-Jones, ‘a legacy from their own immediate past, from the experience of the nationalist movement’.¹ Independent India’s politics, at least in the initial years, drew on these two legacies. The nationalist ideology, which was hardly derivative, remained the driving force in charting out India’s future. Hence political institutions, despite their imperial roots, acted in a manner that was reminiscent of an independent state, imbued with enthusiasm for a new beginning. Yet the importance of the prevalent social order, the divided social structure and the inevitable social conflicts in shaping the political process cannot be overlooked. There were also rich civilizational traditions that preceded the British rule and remained a binding force, despite the triumph of divisive politics with the emergence of Pakistan in 1947 as a precondition for independence from the British rule. There is thus no doubt that Indian politics cannot be grasped without understanding the historical processes that remained most critical even after independence, for reasons connected with the peculiar circumstances in which India emerged in the comity of free nations. It would thus be wrong to suggest that Indian politics even after decolonization remained as it was in the past simply because the historical context underwent massive changes. It would also not be entirely correct to argue that Indian politics was absolutely innovative in its post-colonial phase because the colonial past, though much derided, has, in fact, left behind a substantial political imprint.

The aim of this chapter is thus twofold: first, to briefly discuss the nature of partition and its outcome and, second, by dealing with the ideological basis of the post-colonial political leadership in India that had roots in the nationalist struggle, to draw out the political significance of those principles and values that laid the institutional foundation of a decolonized India.

Partition of the subcontinent

Partition is ‘the moment of the constitutional establishment of two dominions with accompanying bloodbath’.² Pressing for a separate Muslim state, the 1940 Lahore resolution was the first official pronouncement of the Pakistan or partition by the Muslim League. Though the term ‘Pakistan’ was nowhere mentioned, by demanding an independent state or states for the Muslims the resolution translated the goal of a sovereign Muslim state into concrete terms.³ Seeking to organise Indian Muslims around the Pakistan demand, the resolution was thus historically significant for at least two important reasons: first, that the resolution was proposed by Fazlul Haq, the most popular Muslim leader in Bengal, suggests the growing dominance of the League in the Muslim-majority provinces; and second, for the first time an unequivocal demand was formally articulated insisting that the areas in India in which Muslims constituted a majority should be made into an independent state containing autonomous and sovereign units.⁴ Furthermore, it argued that Indian Muslims constituted a majority nation in the north-west and the east of India and ought to be treated on a par with the Hindu majority in all future constitutional negotiations.

Despite doubts of Pakistan’s viability, the colonial power became increasingly sensitive to the claims advanced by the Muslim League. By 1945, not only did the League insist on ‘the division of India as the only solution of the complex constitutional problem of India’,⁵ its election campaign was also based on the issue of Pakistan. If the Muslims voted in favour of the League in the 1946 elections, ‘the League will be entitled to ask for Pakistan without any further investigation or plebiscite’.⁶ During the election campaign, Jinnah also identified the areas constituting Pakistan. According to him, those provinces with a clear Muslim majority naturally belonged to Pakistan. Hence, Sind, Baluchistan, the North West Frontier Province and Punjab in the north-west, and Bengal and Assam in the north-east of India were earmarked for Pakistan. The forthcoming elections, he declared, ‘will decide the matter once for all and when they are over, Pakistan will become an immediate reality’.⁷ In Punjab, Jinnah and his League colleagues were reported to have drawn on the religious sentiments of the Muslim voters by underlining that ‘the question a voter is called on to answer is—are you a true believer or an infidel and a traitor’.⁸ As the poll outcome revealed, the 1946 election was a referendum for the League.⁹ Although in the first provincial poll in 1937 the League failed to make an impact even in the Muslim-majority provinces, within nine years, in 1946, it became the only representative of the Muslims by polling in most, if not all, cases close to its maximum natural strength. This was a remarkable achievement in terms of both leadership and organisation. An unambiguous verdict in favour of the Muslim League in the Muslim-majority provinces in the 1946 elections radically altered India’s political landscape in which the League emerged as a stronger party in its negotiations with the British in the last phase of the transfer of power.

The contradictory nature of the reality of 15 August 1947 continues to intrigue the historian even after more than half a century since India was partitioned. Freedom was won but was accompanied by the trauma of partition and mayhem that followed immediately before the transfer of power was formally articulated. So India’s independence represents a great paradox of history. The nationalist movement led to freedom, but failed to avoid partition. The success of the nationalist movement was therefore also its failure. Why did it happen? The answer lies in another paradox, namely the success and failure of the anti-imperialist movement, led by Gandhi and his Congress colleagues. In its struggle against the colonial power, the Congress had a twofold task: moulding different classes, communities and groups into a nation and winning freedom for this emerging nation. The Congress had succeeded in mobilizing the nation against the British that accounted for the final withdrawal of the British rule in India; it was however virtually unsuccessful ‘in welding the diversity into a nation and particularly failed to integrate the Muslims into this nation’.¹⁰ Underlying this conundrum—the success and failure of the nationalist movement—lies the roots of the paradox of independence that came along with the Great Divide of the subcontinent of India. Independence and partition were, as a commentator argues, ‘but the reflection of the success and failure of the strategy of the [Congress-led] nationalist movement’.¹¹ The 1947 partition was therefore not merely a physical division of the subcontinent; it also radically altered its complexion by seeking to define its members in conformity with the constructed political boundary in the aftermath of the transfer of power. For the Muslims, 1947 was not merely about partition; it was also about freedom from both the British and the Hindu ruling authority. For the Hindus in Bengal, for instance, it created a sense of home¹²—where they were safe and protected.¹³ Although it was undoubtedly a watershed in many respects,¹⁴ not everything in India changed irrevocably as a result of these two linked events—independence and partition. Independent India remained, at least in the initial decades of her independence, a hostage of her colonial past.

Political economy of India as a nation-state

India’s post-colonial political economy is neither purely capitalist nor feudal but a peculiar admixture of the two. Hence, just like India’s evolution as a nation in the aftermath of decolonization in 1947, the path of development that India adopted can never be conceptualized in a straightforward manner. The Preamble to the Constitution of India laid the foundation of the socialistic pattern of society in which the state remained the most critical player. Accordingly, the Directive Principles of State Policy (Part IV of the Constitution) emphasize that the goal of the Indian polity is not unbridled laissez faire but a welfare state where the state has a positive duty to ensure to its citizens social and economic justice with dignity of the individual consistent with the unity and integrity of the nation. By making them fundamental in governance, and making the laws of the country and duty of the state to apply these principles, the founding fathers made it the responsibility of future governments to find a middle way between individual liberty and the public good, between preserving the property and privilege of the few and bestowing benefits on the many in order to liberate the powers of individuals equally for contributions to the common good.¹⁵ This new institutional matrix consisted of ‘a regulatory regime’ comprising (a) public sector expansion, (b) discretionary controls over markets and private economic activities and (c) stringent foreign exchange and import controls. The first two had their roots in the ideology of socialism while the last one had its roots in economic nationalism. Taken together, they articulated ‘activism of the newly established nation state’.¹⁶

In this model of state-directed development, the most significant instrument was the Planning Commission that came into being in January 1950 despite serious opposition of the Gandhians within the Congress Working Committee. However, the cabinet resolution that finally led to the creation of the Commission underlined three major principles as special terms of reference in the preparation of the plans, which largely defused opposition. These principles were: (a) that the citizens, men and women equally, have the right to an adequate means of livelihood; (b) that the ownership and control of the material resources of the country are so distributed as best to subserve the common good; and (c) that the operation of the economic system does not result in the concentration of wealth and means of production to the common detriment.¹⁷ Underlining the ideological commitment of the nation, the 1948 Industrial Policy Resolution therefore begins by stating that

[t]he nation has now set itself to establish a social order where justice and equality of opportunity shall be secured to all the people. For this purpose, careful planning and integrated efforts over the whole field of national activity are necessary; and the Government of India proposes to establish a National Planning Commission to formulate programmes of development and to secure its execution.

(para. 1)

Accordingly, the 1948 Industrial Policy Resolution insisted that the state should play a progressively active role in the development of critical industries, such as (a) industries manufacturing arms and ammunition, production and control of atomic energy and the ownership and management of railway transport and (b) basic industries, namely iron, coal, steel, aircraft manufacture, shipbuilding and oil. This resolution was reiterated in the 1955 Avadi session of the Congress by underlining that, in view of the declared objective being a socialist pattern of society, the state shall play a vital role in planning and development. The next landmark event confirming the intention of an activist state was the industrial policy resolution of 1956, which was adopted after parliament had accepted in December 1954 a socialist pattern of society as the objective of social and economic policy and the Second Five-Year Plan (also known as the Mahalanobis Plan) articulated this ideological goal in formal terms. P. C. Mahalanobis, the architect of the plan, argued for state-controlled economic development for accelerating the tempo of growth under ‘the autarkic industrialization strategy’.¹⁸ Hence he insisted that the basic and heavy industries should remain in the public sector for two reasons: (a) the private sector may not be able to raise adequate resources for these very capital-intensive industries and even if it managed it would command a monopolistic control that was deemed detrimental to social welfare; and (b) by controlling allocation of output of basic and heavy industries according to social priorities, it was certain that the government would be able to channel private sector growth to fulfil its ideological goal. In seeking to fulfil the objective of a socialist pattern of society, the Nehru-led government envisaged an expanded role of public sector and the importance of planning in all-round development of the country.

Planning for development: a panacea or failure?

Planning seems a formidable operational tool to structure the role of the state in accordance with its ideological underpinning. Therefore not only is planning as an instrument tuned to economic regeneration, it is inextricably tied to the regime’s political preferences as well. This is, however, not to conceptualize the relationship between planning and the ideological slant of the regime in a deterministic way, but to underline the complex interdependence, which entails, at the same time, an interplay of various pulls and pressures in a rapidly changing social fabric. Planning is thus ‘an exercise of instrumental rationality…institutionalized …outside the normal processes of representative politics [and executed] through a developmental administration’.¹⁹ Notwithstanding the critical significance of planning, the developmental project in India, argues Aseema Sinha, ‘was and continues to be constrained by the pattern of mediation between the centre and regions’.²⁰ Furthermore, a centralized planning also led to the expansion for regionalism in India presumably because of ‘haphazard and unequal’ development of constituent provinces. Regional differences and politico-economic conflicts arising out of a centrally engineered scheme remain critical in post-independent India’s political economy, besides the exogenous influences in the wake of globalization.

Historically, the Congress was persuaded by the arguments supporting planning for development. Contrary to Gandhi’s explicit opposition to ‘planned development’, the Congress Party showed ample interest in socialistic means, including planning and heavy industrialization, as ‘essential to make revolutionary changes in the present economic and social structure of society and to remove gross inequalities’ since 1929. Within two years, the 1931 Karachi Congress adopted a resolution insisting on state ownership of ‘key industries and services, mineral resources, railways, waterways, shipping and other means of public transport’. However in 1934, the Congress Working Committee passed a resolution at Banaras stressing that ‘large and organized industries are in no need of the services of Congress organizations or of any Congress effort on their behalf. Critical of the above, Jawaharlal Nehru rallied support to reformulate the resolution with a view to soliciting Congress backing for industrialization and planning, which, he believed, was the only available means to attain substantial economic development in India.²¹ A compromise formula was reached in Bombay at the Congress Working Committee meeting in September 1934. Accordingly, the top priority was accorded to small-scale cottage industries. Encouraged by the partial support of the party, although neither funding nor organizational support was available from the Congress, Nehru in his 1936 Faizpur presidential address argued strongly in favour of heavy industrialization and coordination of human resources through planning.

Planning seems to have provided the Congress stalwarts with a platform to articulate different ideological positions. Drawing on their respective ideological leanings, Nehru hailed industrialism whereas Gandhi opposed it since he felt that, instead of contributing to the general welfare, machine civilization would not only expose Indians to a worse kind of exploitation but also lead to a general degradation of human life. Although Nehru and Gandhi were poles apart on occasions, the former, unlike his militant colleague Subhas Bose, never pursued his differences with the latter to the extent of causing a split within the Congress. Despite the adverse ideological implication of aligning with Gandhi, Nehru as a pragmatist participated wholeheartedly in the Gandhi-led freedom struggle, for he knew that the attainment of independence was prior to ideology. So the controversy involving Gandhi and Nehru vis-à-vis planning and industrialization was just a signpost indicating the likely tension in view of the Congress effort to create an anti-British platform incorporating even c...