Join the Debate – Are smaller states good for India?
Please use this thread to share thoughts, comments and ideas on re-organisation of states in India.
To kick-start the discussion, excerpts from a few thought-provoking posts and articles below. The first excerpt from To reform UP, trifurcate it by Pratap Bhanu Mehta:
…But neither political party (Congress or BJP) is willing to be politically imaginative and ask a more fundamental question: what are the reforms needed to bring about the kind of radical change that politics in UP requires?
The answer to this question is complex. But most observers would agree that one reform essential for the well-being of the state’s citizens is the further break-up of the state into at least three more states. Whether this should be along the lines of the often discussed divisions of Harit Pradesh, Purvanchal and Bundelkhand can be debated. But the desirability of breaking up the state ought to be self-evident. Amitabh Bachchan’s latest advertisement may mushily try to project the identity of UP. But this behemoth of a 170 million citizens makes little sense. There is no administrative rationale, no economic justification, no compelling political logic, and not even any linguistic or cultural framework for holding the state together. Rather than uniting on short-sighted constitutional shenanigans, the Congress and the BJP would display far more political innovation if they united on making the break-up of UP possible.
…there is a case to be made for India having more states — a number possibly closer to fifty. Some of the arguments for smaller states apply across the board generally: in large states there are often too many sub-regional disparities that get glossed over by treating the state as a sacrosanct unit. There is the possibility that citizens of smaller states have more homogeneous preferences that make for more effective collective action. The standard arguments that more states might mean more barriers for creating an integrated market are less compelling, given the overall harmonisation between the policies of states on issues like taxation that is already under way.
…Smaller states like Himachal, Haryana and Uttaranchal have done reasonably well. The exception to this is the Northeast, but that is largely a consequence of aligning ethnicity with territoriality rather than the fact that they are small states. There may be no knock-down argument that can prove that small states within a federal polity will always be better, but on balance smaller states are more desirable than bigger ones.
Next a short but crisp post from Pragmatic Euphony in which he asks Five questions. I particularly liked Question #4.
- Why has a comprehensive study of the societal, political and economic impact of smaller states not been undertaken so many decades after the creation of smaller states?
- What is holding the government back from announcing the formation of a new State Reorganisation Commission with eminent personalities on board?
- Should a new state not be created only after its economic viability has been established by a non-partisan statutory body and vetted by the Parliament?
- Isn’t the public dissatisfaction and discontentment in states — big or small — really about (lack of) governance, and has nothing to do with smaller or bigger states?
- If smaller states are a ploy to bring political governance closer to the populace, then shouldn’t empowerment of local self-government institutions provide a more permanent answer?
and finally, excerpts from Offstumped’s post on this:
The Telangana debate is both a challenge and an opportunity to our democracy.
The challenge is well understood and compiled below in the many posts on Telangana and on the question of smaller states in general.
The opportunity on the other hand is poorly understood. In the debate over Union Territory status to Hyderabad and on the larger question of share of spoils lies an opportunity to revisit the debate on Federalism and autonomy to states and local government.
…Need of the hour is a Federalist Response that would be bold and imaginative in its advocacy of the Autonomous Rights of States from Kashmir to Gujarat with the freedom to make Socio-Economic choices
…Offstumped has always been in favor of smaller states with the premise that they make for better delivery of public services, greater accountability and greater opportunities and access to opportunities. The experience of the recently created states by the BJP lead NDA however has been mixed. While Uttarakhand has seen a stable two party political system with a focus on governance, Jharkhand has brought out the worst in our Parliamentary democracy. Chattisgarh though producing a stable polity has been at the receiving end of the naxalite menace.
With Goa consistently producing split verdicts and legislative instability some have questioned the wisdom of creating smaller states.
It is a disingenuous argument. If one traces the root cause for instability in Jharkhand and Goa it has more to do with the Congress’ shameful track record in respecting State’s rights and its utter lack of commitment to federalism.
So where do you stand on this? and where does this stop?
Are we ready for 50 states in India? Are we ready for the financial burden that this might create on a narrow tax base? Are we prepared to be imaginative and bold and keep the administrative bureaurcracy at the same levels after the split of states rather than expanding it?
Are smaller states really needed – or do we need more power to local civic authorities? and does this lead to further fragmentation of identity? or does it (paradoxically) strengthen the idea of India?
Do share your thoughts.
Finally, for those of you too young to remember, this is how it was, once upon a time (Image courtesy: GlobalSecurity.org)
Somewhat Related Posts:
Alaskonomics and Bihar – Part I
“Maharashtranomics†and Bihar
Another interesting graphic:
I agree with Pragmatic Euphony on these –
4. Isn’t the public dissatisfaction and discontentment in states — big or small — really about (lack of) governance, and has nothing to do with smaller or bigger states?
5. If smaller states are a ploy to bring political governance closer to the populace, then shouldn’t empowerment of local self-government institutions provide a more permanent answer?
And those ought to be look into as possible solutions. If this fails then analyze dividing states. The present debate seems to assume that splitting states is better. This is an assumption, rather than proof. It is not as if there are no decently governed states in India.
Also, there’ll be no end to the demands of newer states. Will each be acquised? If lack of development is the trigger for demand of a new state, then doing so is no guarantee of that happening. Rather, reforming governance, empowering local inst. have a better chance of providing answers. The present demands and decisions for splitting states have strong political considerations. That too should be kept in mind.
I posted this on Offstumped too.
I think the fundamental question we should be asking is What is the purpose of a state?. Are the state boundaries drawn for the purpose of better administration and and Governance? Or they are defined based on a ethnic/lingusitic/religious/geographic or some other identity shared by a group of people?
We as a country needs to address that issue first once we find an answer to that question then we can create another SRC or some other mechanism to address the creation of new states if necessary. Basically we as a Country needs to define how do we want organize ourselves. It could be done either through a referendum or Constitutional Convention or a Committee. I am not sure which is the best way but just find a process and find out from the entire country how do we want to organize India.
Once that is settled then we can decide how many states we need and how to organize them.
Personally I think if based on a shared identity there is a valid historical reason for a group of people to demand a State then we should not hesitate to create a state for them. So you can really big states and really small states exactly like in USA California/Rhode Island.
But creating a new state for administrative or efficient Governance purpose is a hogwash. Regardless of the size of the state the day to day Governance activities should be left to local Government. They should have power to levy taxes and should be able to spend the money as they see fit,Leaving the State/Central Government to focus on State/National level issues. That would improve the lives of people drastically not carving out small states for the sake of it.
@ Dosabandit: I agree with you (and with Pragmatic) that we may be jumping the gun too quickly on this…Thanks for highlighting the underlying assumption in the present debate viz. splitting states = better governance.
@ Karthik: I am glad you brought into relief the point about identity. I feel that is not being debated enough…
As you say, Are state boundaries “defined based on a ethnic/lingusitic/religious/geographic or some other identity shared by a group of people?”
Sadly, becuase it is such a hard question to discuss/answer, I think it will most likely be sidelined in the discussion on this issue in MSM (and on TV channels)…
Shantanu,
viz. splitting states = better governance.
How about the following underlying assumptions:
“splitting states = better participation from citizens” or
“splitting states = more local governance => Better accountability”
Do the above hold true without making additional changes to decentralize and not just creating more states? I’m a newb to this topic, more information (than opinion) would be helpful to learn.
Perhaps the more relevant issue would be decentralization.
Dear Shantanu
I’ll simply focus on one issue: “Isn’t the public dissatisfaction and discontentment in states — big or small — really about (lack of) governance, and has nothing to do with smaller or bigger states?”
The test of a hypothesis that the size of a state is related to better governance is to look at India’s experience.
In general India is MISERABLY GOVERNED. 2 out of 10 in terms of governance (at best). It is possible that Gujarat and Maharashtra (big) may get 3 out of 10, Goa and Delhi (small) may get 3 out of 10 as well. On the other hand Meghalaya (small) will perhaps get 1 out of 10, along with Assam, Bihar, and UP (large).
Results (this is conceptual):
a) There is NO CORRELATION between the size of a state and the quality of governance (in India or elsewhere in the world, imho – I just thought about Australia, for instance, and came to the same result).
b) ALL states in India are BADLY GOVERNED in comparison to world standards and nothing will change by combining or splitting the states unless its fundamental model changes.
What is needed, therefore, is a fundamental change in the way of governance. That is what the Freedom Team of India (http://freedomteam.in/)is all about. We are interested in getting the whole of India a 9 out of 10 on governance, wealth, and peace. A quantum shift in India’s way of life. Not interested in debates about irrelevant topics like the size of a state.
For new readers, who may not have heard about FTI, please check its website and consider joining up as a citizen-leader (of which there is a DESPERATE SHORTAGE in India – it is amazing that after nearly 2 years only two dozen genuine leaders have been found in India).
Also do read my book, ‘Breaking Free of Nehru’ now available as a free e-book (a replica of the published Anthem Press version), at http://bfn.sabhlokcity.com/
I suggest that we try to change India’s governance ***entirely*** and not fret about the size of states which is irrelevant to the way India’s citizens are governed.
Therefore in my opinion, this is a lot of sound and fury about nothing. Indeed, I believe that splitting states imposes significant administrative costs – and unless there is a genuine improvement in governance, this is a negative step.
Regards
Sanjeev
In India I have a simple principle, Less government is good government !! Since all governments are slow and corrupt, less you have of it the better it is. Anyways this dividing of states is to leverage political benefit for a few people while the general population would remain just as neglected.
More decentralization along with greater resources to the state governments should result in better administration (assuming no corruption). The state governments have various responsibilities (law and order for one) but the amount of funding it receives doesn’t justify the revenue it earns. A dramatic downsizing of the central government is needed with more funds and authority to downstream govt. bodies such as the state and panchayat level govt. Maybe a certain portion of the income tax collected from a particular region should be given to the region itself.
Sanjeev never misses a chance for FTI! FTI is a more or less a hopeless organization and will remain so. FTI’s policies are irrational, impractical and based on Christianity. Most of the FTI fellows are as we see in state of mental evolution. FTI fellows feel mentally elevated by policies which are FRENCH POLICIES, BRITISH POLICIES, AUSTRALIAN POLICIES, AMERICAN POLICIES which in turn can be summarized as IMPERIALISTIC POLICIES. FTI fellows are more knowledgeable about Biblical teachings and are avid lover of SECULARISM, new mental thought process of mentally evolving Christians. SECULARISM fundamental is derived from Biblical teaching, propagating religion… ie Kick starting the great marathon of proving religious superiority… That is why one sees every tom, dick and harry of world proclaiming to be the greatest seer of the world in name of religion. One will see FTI member supporting turban ban for Sikhs… In history of India, genocide was (1) IGNITED by Moslems, one needs to read VIVID poetic memoirs of representor of love of Allah, Great Leader Of Peace, Timur the Lame in Tuzk-e-Taimuri (2) FURTHERED by Christians (3)NURTURED and CULTIVATED by SECULARISTS.
Now coming to the smaller states… Smaller state MAY create multiple opportunities for growth. Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh are great examples. While Jharkhand has been raped by SECULARISTS, Chhattisgarh has managed to fulfill aspirations of it’s people and is developing rapidly due to able leadership of Raman Singh, whom no doubt FTI will claim as SECULARIST, although he may never even say so.
With respect to Telengana and their leader KRC, I have 100% confidence that he will rape and plunder Telengana better than Andhraites did.
1)Our Indian Constitution and our setup promotes more and more people to take active participation in the democracy of country by de-centralizing of powers. I support the policy of smaller states as it will give a chance for more people to participate in electrol politics.
2)Unity in Diversity .. is what we have , hence we should accept the fact that india is made up of many languages and each of us bears a lot of respect n affinity for our mother tongue, and people of a similar mother tongue tend to get along naturaly and care for their people in the community .. hence States created even on the basis of Language is also i support.
In the past 15 years there have been 3 new states formed. As acknowledged by most people, UK has definitely gained. And there are mixed results from Chattisgarh and Jharkhand.
Now is smaller state= better governance? yes it could increase the probability of equitable development. But how small? Is Goa situation ok? Digambar Kamath(who has changed 3 parties) becomes CM irrespective of which power is voted to power :). There is much more horse trading.
So the centre has to come with a clear policy on division of states. Because such demands will always come in because of political gains. KCR could not have ever become CM of AP but with Telangana he could.
In my view, it will help states which are very big, UP,MP. But gorkhaland, coorg will just become another Goa if given statehood. So there shd be a minimum eligibility criteria say 20 Loksabha seats or equivalently about 130 MLA in the Vidhana Sabha. So such a policy will say “if you don’t have a sizable area, you are too fringe to ask for a state” This will actually work as the basic eligibility and the others are as to how revenue genaration model will be etc.,
Hope some sane voice comes up from the nationally relavant parties.
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There is NO CORRELATION between the size of a state and the quality of governance (in India or elsewhere in the world, imho – I just thought about Australia, for instance, and came to the same result).
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But what percentage of land in Australia is habitable/inhabited, and thus, requires governance? Would that render Australia big or small?
> coorg will just become another Goa if given statehood.
Yes. I am from Kodagu ( misnomer Coorg ) and I don’t it to be another state. I agree with those who posted that it’s only the agenda of certain sections of the population with perceived grievances. There’s no end to statehood demands if we continue this way. All the more easy for external forces to pit one of us against another.
http://indianrealist.wordpress.com/2009/10/24/how-brits-created-terrorism-in-south-asia/
These type of agendas only serve the purpose of politicians and political parties. Why not to focus on getting rid of current mess created over the period of more than 60 years. Basic issues like food, shelter, clothing, clean water to each every single citizen needs to be addressed rather than to get tempted and lost in never ending issues like creation of small states and further more states.Even if you create small states, corruption will still remain the bane and will prove to be a spoilsport in the so called development in small states. The need of the hour is reforms to change the ever rotten national character and values.Get real and if you care a bit about your country and if you have it in you- Reform it, as simple as that.
I have to agree with Rohit. Of late, Sanjeev seems to use every opportunity to plug his Freedom team and that book of his which is pure drivel. It has little understanding of Nehru’s legacy and even less understanding of unfettered capitalism which is responsible for the global economic meltdown we all experience today. If India escapes this economic downturn and manages to grow at the 8 or 9% growth rate as predicted, part of that is because of the “socialist” structures and institutions put in place by Nehru and strengthened by Indira Gandhi . I am no fan of socialism or communism, nor for that matter the Nehru-Gandhi family, but let us leave poor Nehru to rest in peace.
One of reasons why India is poorly governed is that we the citizens have failed in our duty to be vigilant and activist. The only activists we really have are of the Arundathi Roy ilk who try to impede progress and provide support to militant (terrorist) groups. Instead of demanding our rights to clean water, roads, electicity etc., we have allowed our taxes to be used without accountability.
Secondly we seem to have become a nation of fragmented short term interests as opposed to a nation of a uniform long term vision and goal. So every community (however it defines itself) thinks of itself as a separate entity out to get whatever little benefit it can out of the system at the expense of the whole nation. We have become, as Naipaul so succinctly put it, a nation of a million mutinies. However a million mutinies do not become a superpower. Only a nation which has a clear sense of self-identity and civilizational purpose can become a superpower. To see this, all we have to do is to look at our neighbor China.
The further fragmentation of states will probably further fragment us as a people. We might even see religious groups with states like Kerala or Tamil Nadu split along religious or community lines. This bowing down to every special interest group simply to keep votes, is always a disturbing sign in a democracy.
All: Thanks for a very robust debate…I will respond later today…In the meantime, pl do continue to share your thoughts.
Seems to me there is a general consensus here that small states and better governance do not have any discernible correlation.
And whether it is Telangana or demand for some other small state, it is always some vested interests, usually the elite of the area, who use the issue as an easy way to get power.More often than not, one or the other national parties (INC/BJP) see political benefit in supporting the cause.
It is ultimately counter productive to bring issues of federalism into the question of small states.Issues related to centre-state relations are the same, irrespective of the size of the state.And the approach of using ‘language’ as a determinator of state formation is as good as any others proposed.Even then, it is possible for a single state to have harmonious relations between multiple linguistic communities, as we have seen in the case of Karnataka, for example.
A plug: If any of you are interested in the Telangana issue per se, I have done a couple of posts about it.
@ KK: I think you are on to something…I agree that a lot of “issues” associated with “large” states can be meaningfully resolved by simply having more local governance or decentralization.
I have not explored this issue in depth in a very long time so need to catch up on this (educating myself was one of the reasons for opening this thread).
@ Sanjeev: I agree that “ALL states in India are BADLY GOVERNED..and nothing will change by combining or splitting the states unless its fundamental model changes”
However this is a very *live* (and emotive) issue at present so I do not think it is irrelevant.
@ Sachin: “In India I have a simple principle, Less government is good government !!” That is probably true for everywhere!!
@ daanveer karna said: “A dramatic downsizing of the central government is needed with more funds and authority to downstream govt. bodies such as the state and panchayat level govt.” I think what you are saying is what KK had in mind.
@ Rohit: “FTI’s policies are irrational, impractical and based on Christianity” – Thats a pretty strong statement to make Rohit. Anything to back it up?
@ Mahesh: “I support the policy of smaller states as it will give a chance for more people to participate in electrol politics” I am not sure I understood that…Can you pl explain?
@ Vishwa: “So the centre has to come with a clear policy on division of states. Because such demands will always come in because of political gains” You are right…We do need a States Reorganisation Commission instead of ad-hoc, knee-jerk reactions…and yes, there needs to be certain criteria
@ Bhuvan said: “The need of the hour is reforms to change the ever rotten national character and values” I don’t disagree but as I mentioned in my response to Sanjeev, you just cannot pretend that there is no debate happening.
@ Harapriya: “If India escapes this economic downturn and manages to grow at the 8 or 9% growth rate as predicted, part of that is because of the “socialist†structures and institutions…” That may be so but imagine how much more growth would have been achived in the lost years (50s through 80s) if more rational policies had been followed.
But I completely agree with you that “One of reasons why India is poorly governed is that we the citizens have failed in our duty to be vigilant and activist…and Secondly we seem to have become a nation of fragmented short term interests as opposed to a nation of a uniform long term vision and goal”
@ Kumar_N: “Issues related to centre-state relations are the same, irrespective of the size of the state” – good point. I’ll have a look at your posts.
Shantanu,
(educating myself was one of the reasons for opening this thread).
I think it is time for something similar to Goldwin’s Law for comment threads on your blog.
“Learning opportunity from comment threads is proportional to the number of comments it takes before some one blames Islam, Christianity or Secularism [unless the thread was about the above topics to start with]”.
🙂
I admire your patience to keep the debate on track! It would be good if someone can post links to more studies about decentralized local governance. This is one of the ways I see to ensure robust feedback loop which can guarantee accountability of administrators/leaders and hopefully converge to good governance over a period of time. Any study with comparison to other democracies and governance structures would also be helpful to learn.
KK,
This is my theory:
The more decentralised the governance is, the better the self-respect of the citizens and their willingness to take responsibility for local civic issues. This in turn leads to overall good governance, and better local management of divisive or contentious issues, allowing the federal govt the bandwidth to manage pan-national and external issues better.
I have done a rudimentary post on this issue 3 years back.
http://kumarsbol.blogspot.com/2006/05/local-self-government-in-india-and-uk.html
In the current context of a discussion about small states, I am of the opinion that unless we sort out the ills in district, mandal and village level governance, creation of smaller states will only serve to address the political aspirations of regional elites, while not necessarily improving the lives of the citizens. So, a new SRC does not make sense without an ARC (Administrative Reforms Commission). We also need to review the reasons for the implementation failure of the Panchayati Raj amendment to the Constitution.
Call me a cynic, but when we talk about empowerment esp. more taxation and budgeting powers to lower levels, the political class on the whole would not show any enthusiasm.Politicians of all hues prefer centralization as that will allow them to play the role of ‘mai-baap’ doling out funds to narrow interests.
Another factor to be considered is the use of information technology in governance.IT is being used as a tool for centralization in most cases.Of course, Data collection, measurement and analysis is required at a higher level of governance.But the same data should be avaialble to local administrators and civic bodies so that they can make better decisions.
The State and Union govts then need to play an oversight role, apart from focusing their energies on pan-state or pan-national concerns such as river water management, highways, space research, power generation, external trade, defence and so on.
Rohit: “FTI’s policies are irrational, impractical and based on Christianity†– Thats a pretty strong statement to make Rohit. Anything to back it up?
If one reads any FTI guy commenting, he will draw inspiration from French policies, Australian policies, American policies. For example the five point theory of leadership of Sanjeev. His theory of comparison of state of India scaling on a rank of 10. Why doesn’t he better advocate democratic imperialism under aegis of Australia or France or what ever Christian country he likes? Why not be honest and open? The name FTI is slavery to Christianity.
I am pasting the points I made in this blog.
Yes smaller states may be efficient but we cannot say that it is always true. Division cannot be done on caste/ethnic/religious lines. All demands need to be considered but all demands need not be accepted. There should be a limit on the minimum size required for a region to be state. A state cannot be created out of a district. Creation of a state may not always mean better infrastructure. My brother-in-law recently went to Patna and he was shocked to find that there is no public transport even in the capital of Bihar. It may also lead to more fiscal deficit, as governments are spendthrifts. It may also lead to the domination of one group which is majority in the state as smaller states tend to have lesser groups that normally balance against each other in larger states. This is a very important factor that we need to consider.
If you take the recently formed small states (or even large states for that matter) the states with higher literacy rate perform well and the states with lower literacy rate perform badly. For example the literacy rate of Haryana is 71%, Himachal is 81% and Uttarakhand is 75% which are well performing while Jharkhand and Chattisgarh with literacy ratios of 58% and 63% are not performing well.
If this is taken as benchmark then it is tough future for Telangana. The literacy rate of Telangana is 54%, Coastal Andhra is 67% and Rayalaseema is 60%. Even for the rest of Andhra it is not very bright.
The full details are available at – Do Smaller States Lead to Better Growth?
@ Kumar_N: I am of the opinion that unless we sort out the ills in district, mandal and village level governance, creation of smaller states will only serve to address the political aspirations of regional elites, while not necessarily improving the lives of the citizens.
I agree…which is why I find a lot of merit in Sanjeev’s comment (above)…and you are right that “a new SRC does not make sense without an ARC (Administrative Reforms Commission)” To that I would add, a PRS – Politics Reforms Commission…
I am slowly coming around to the view that at the heart of all corruption, mis-governance, lack of good leadership etc etc is the role of money-power in elections, specifically campaign finance…which deters even the most passionate believers in participatory democracy from standing for elections – thus limiting all good ideas/suggestions to forums like these (and newspapers) while the political elite simply do what they wish (or respond in a knee-jerk fashion).
Shaan: I will have alook at your link.
Kumar_N, Thanks for the link.
Shantanu,
The real issue is curtail the power of politicians. It is in the best interest of the politicians to protect the current structure in India. It is frustrating. Truth be told, there is little incentive for them to change anything as change would work against them. It would be stupid to expect sustained change out of *good will* or *noble intentions*. Noble intentions may produce difference here or there, but nothing that will last.
But change will come if it becomes inevitable [for the survival of the current politicians themselves]. As Dr. JP from Loksatta has hypothesized reform in the political process is going to become inevitable due to economic growth. As I mentioned in another thread, for the sake of India I hope he is right.
We have to close the feedback loop. Ruling masses right now operate in kind of open loop, when it comes to governance. I believe such closure on accountability can happen effectively at local level.
Any study with comparison of operating governance models (India Vs other countries) across different sectors (education, infrastructure devp etc) would be useful to learn. I know Dr. Sanjeev has deals with some of this in his book.
I remember a story. When asked to solve a problem, a typical bureaucrat who has no knowledge beyond NCERT books and some stupid history books, said he needs to see solution to the problem. If a so called uneducated person faces a problem, he somehow doesn’t need to see solution to the problem. He tries to solve the problem in his or her own way and somehow solves the problem by simple logic of defining, identifying, removing.
There is nothing sacrosanct about 25 or 27 or 28 states for India. India should have as many states as its development requires. Splitting an administrative division like the state should not be confused with splitting a nation. However, in India we have gotten into a situation where splitting a state is as emotive as splitting a nation. US with 1/3 population has 50 states and runs smooth without major issues.
Many Indian states are bigger than most nations. UP could rank among the top 6 countries in population, and Rajasthan is larger in area than 140 countries including Germany and Japan. Given that the India’s democracy stops at the state level with very weak district/village level democratic infrastructure, we are putting too many apples in the basket of state administrations. Linguistic centric states also have far too much of sub-nationalism where feeling of India can get sometimes less important than feeling of their state and this is not a good situation. Splitting of Washington or Oregon in the US wouldn’t have spilled this much blood.
Small states perform better than bigger states in most indicators. Except for Maharashta and TN almost all big states are laggards in economic and social indicators. India’s biggest states – Bihar, UP, MP, AP, J&K form the bottom in literacy, per-capita income, vaccination rate and human development indicators while small states like Punjab, Haryana, Kerala, Goa, Delhi, HP rank close to the top.
The track record of the split states in the last round also shows faster growth than when they were in the bigger unit – Jharakhand, which split from Bihar, had 125 point increase in HDI numbers since 1996, Bihar since then had only 60 point increase. Uttarakhand had a 150 point increase while its parent UP had only 58 point increase. No doubt, Jharkhand and Chattisgraph has still enormous problems but they are no more than when they were a part of Bihar and MP.
@ KK: I am certain that there must be comparative studies of India and other countries with regards governance models in education, infrastructure etc. A quick google search should throw up some interesting stuff…will try and see if I can find something this weekend.
***
@ Balaji: “in India we have gotten into a situation where splitting a state is as emotive as splitting a nation” – So true!
@ Shantanu
Now you can make out of the drama they are creating in the parliament and AP. Spineless ‘leaders’ say something one day and take U turn next day. Who is bothered about price rise,farmers suicide, terrorism,drought. These ‘trivial’issues don’t get you votes but opening a pandora box does.News channels/media is just like another entertainment channel now a days and have already become a favourite past time for many people. That’s why it’s quite an appropriate statement atleast in the context of India-The government you have is the government you deserve. It’s better to pretend that there is no such debate happening because these debate won’t take you anywhere other than satisfying your unproductive thought process.
Andhra, Maharashtra, UP, Orissa, Karnataka:
These states have been a epicenter of farmer suicides. But no government has taken the pain to discuss it openly. Neither media has shown any interest, media telecast the farmer suicide story as just another pick pocketing story. But the same media hyped the issue of Telangana and helped negative powers to achieve their evil desperations.
Now the TV channels are doing rounds of programs for separating Vidharbha from Maharashtra. I’m not against the separate vidharbha in any sense (because I feel that smaller states will lead for better administration), but the same vidharbha has been witnessing the largest suicides by farmers. That time no political party took it to roads to help or solve their problems. But the news of Telangana flashed on TV these dirty politicians made strategy to milk the cow.
This is seriously a disastrous situation. On one side we have Chinese Invasion, just below them Bangladeshi’s intruding, near that we have maoists problem, then we have red corridor, somewhere between we have Jihadi Muslims issuing fatwa against Vande mataram in presence of Central Home Minister, then we pakistan from other side, some Hijbul Mujhahidin from J&K, We also SIMI problem. All this is less or what we again have most immoral, inefficient, corrupt an on top rotten political class.
This Chandrashekhara Rao who lost his own sit had nothing to save his political career so brought this issue out. He could have agitated for farmer’s welfare, de-religion the politics, stop appeasment. This all could have made him a prime minister but such idiots don’t even understand if they work genuinely people will support them.
(I’ll not say god will save this country, but definitely take the pride to say we will save ourself and not just survival but we will prosper despite all odds.)
जय à¤à¤¾à¤°à¤¤!
कृषीदेश
Hi All,
i answered each of the 5 questions in pragmatic euphony as to my knowledge and understanding.
So please let me know if the answers I put miss any thing thanks.
Sravan: would you like to post a brief summary of your responses here?
1. Why has a comprehensive study of the societal, political and economic impact of smaller states not been undertaken so many decades after the creation of smaller states?
Smaller states is a relative term. Smaller by no means indicates a small administrative area or low population. So it would have been better if question was asked in absolute terms.
SRC-I can be considered as one of such first efforts by Union Govt. immediately after independence. Indeed as most people think and propagate SRC did not just look only on linguistic terms but on various socio-political and economic conditions prevailing at that time. Recently three states were created and certainly was based on sustainance and political analysis.
Regarding telangana,
SRC-I recommended that telangana to remain a separate state is beneficial to its people and warned against merging citing differences in socio-economic conditions between the regions and viability of telangana based on its surplus revenues. However,contrary to the reccomendations the merger was done based strictly on linguistic lines. This certainly was the key factor that is the reason for today’s dicontentment among telangana people.
Ofcourse there are several independent studies conducted and published in various journals on these very issue since last 50 years and most of them actually recommend smaller territorial administrative divisions compared to present divisions. Some of them even concentrate on telangana issue and dates back to 1970 to 1997 analysing most aspects of underdevelopment in telangana.
2. What is holding the government back from announcing the formation of a new State Reorganisation Commission with eminent personalities on board?
Because of the failure of strictly following SRC -I reccomendations there is a widespread mistrust among political circles regarding a second report especially in present conditions where personal liability and lobbying play major role in decision-making. No one including the organizations, political parties and people are in favor of a Commision and put their complete future on a commision whose recommendations may or may not be actually truthful. Instead they are trying to push the Union Gov. to decide depending upon popular vote and referendums.
3. Should a new state not be created only after its economic viability has been established by a non-partisan statutory body and vetted by the Parliament?
Contrary to the demands for separate states after independence that were mostly based on culture, language and ethinic identity, most of the present demands cite economic and social backwardness in their regions. So only stressing on economic viablity would backfire considering the actual economic retrogression that was prevalent in most of these regions due to unequal political and bureaucratic dominance after first state reorganisation. Indeed a special package and policy changes favorable to these newly formed states should be considered. However it is necessary to concede to their demands of forming new states to improve general people’s trust on the policy makers. Also necessary steps should be taken to stabilize the administration and proper channeling of funds in these new states. Moreover given the political and bureaucratic imbalance it is highly likely that these special packages and policy changes will be implemented unbiased. This has been already proved in the case of telangana several times. None of the policy changes and packages were ever implemented in correct dimension, lest atleast implemented.
4. Isn’t the public dissatisfaction and discontentment in states — big or small — really about (lack of) governance, and has nothing to do with smaller or bigger states?
Exactly that is what I meant when I mentioned that “smaller†is a relative term. But not considering if the state is really smaller or bigger in relative terms,(unless it is too small and surrounded by a single state on all sides) most of the territories are actually not small in area and population. Territorial division and administatorial sharing provides better decentralization, political autonomy and managerial convenience. Trying to fix the governance with out territorial division would only cause secondary discontentment in other parts of the parent state because to equate the economic conditions the regional govt. and federal govt. has to focus their major resources on to these territories away from other parts.
In all conditions it is in the best interest of all people, Union should concede to these demands.
5. If smaller states are a ploy to bring political governance closer to the populace, then shouldn’t empowerment of local self-government institutions provide a more permanent answer?
That is a bigger picture and certainly is required irrespective of the formation of new states. Even though empowerment and self governance are one of the key points in new state demands, they also are because of the political and economic domination of certain parts of the present states. So empowering local bodies is not just enough.
Indeed empowering local government institutions is highly essential presently and in future to attain what Gandhi’s dream of “Grama Swaraj†it is necessary not to correlate this with the demands of separate states which are purely based on economic and social backwardness due to political neglect.
Shantanu
I hope I did my best. Feedback is genuinely anticipated. I appreciate your interest and concerns.
Sravan: I will respond in a day or two. Thanks
Adding this recent article…Can a reader please help by summarising key points? Any help gratefully appreciated…Thanks
http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/india/article.cfm?articleid=4640
P.S. Would normally have done this myself but am trying hard to cope with the huge backlog from past few days of travelling
question arises why there is need for creation of small state it is due to many reason some possible reason may be political,economical ,social,religious technological like of uttrakhand for bjp and like parties fr self intrest they want to divde us on basis of differnt parametre like of hindu muslims and many oter issue we mst discar these type of polices to better living the day will come when india will not be contry rather state 90
Smaller states are no solution to the so called political , economic and administrative reasons.
For example: If the separate Telangana state is created, the academic books of Telangana and Seemandhra will publish the struggle for united Andhra and separate Telangana in two different versions. This will only create enmity and hatred among Telugu speaking people.
The existing water body tribunals will not be able to solve the water sharing agreements with the ever increasing number of states.
It is only the political clan who will be benefited with creation of smaller states. They may turn these small states into their Jagirs. The politically unemployed will be more benefited. Neither the geographical area, the inflow of waters into the rivers nor the income of the new states will increase. More and more regional parties with regional feelings will come up…
If Bharat was only one state, would it make a difference from what it is now? YES. A reasonably smaller unit of area government can focus better on the needs of the area. Variation in regional conditions may dictate state laws. If a state is too big, the state government may not focus well on the needs of each region. Also, it cannot have different state laws (or policies) for different regions. Overall a state not so big would do better to address the needs of people of the state.
Extensive (area) state has less accessibility to the government simply due to the distance of the government from citizens. SO besides population a reasonable distance to the capital is also important.
Average citizen is more willing to effect a difference in a state than in a country. This logic will apply to a very large state versus reasonably small state. There is more hope to influence laws of a small state by the citizens than in a large state.
Definitely, if Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh were divided into smaller states it will benefit the people of the regions. This reasoning may not cover extremity of this logic that smaller the better. I think Goa and some of the other small states are jokes. They and the country will definitely benefit by merging into a neighboring state.