MAINS QUESTIONS
Q1. The partition of India led to the greatest, abruptest, unplanned, and most disastrous population shift in recorded human history. Analyze the partition’s results for India.
Paper & Topic: GS I – National Movement
Introduction:
- The “last-minute” strategy the British adopted to get agreement over how independence would be attained was the division of British India into the two separate states of India and Pakistan over the weekend of August 14–15, 1947. The majority of people were astonished by the massive migration that followed because few people at the time understood what Partition would imply or what its effects would be.
Body:
India’s response to the division:
Societal repercussions
- Numerous refugees from various faith traditions are entering the country.
- The loss of human resources was enormous because it took in over 16 million uprooted, penniless refugees who needed to be at the very least rehabilitated.
- Migration and congestion are causing population shifts in border towns and cities.
- The conflict between various ethnic groups is mostly caused by the growth of ethnocultural and ethnoreligious minorities.
- The city of Kolkata is getting overly urbanised as a result of a population increase.
- increasing unemployment while making plans for reintegrating refugees
- A trickle of people continued to enter into the 1960s as a result of ongoing racial conflict.
financial effects
- The nickname “the granary of undivided India” refers to West Punjab and Sind because of their historical importance as food producers.
- However, because the two territories were taken over by Pakistan following the partition, India’s ability to produce food was severely limited.
- Due to the long-standing interaction between industries and the agricultural sector for the purpose of obtaining raw materials generated in the agricultural sector, the industrial sector suffered severely from the impact on agriculture.
- The riots that followed the split also led to a substantial exodus of skilled labour from India to Pakistan. Unsurprisingly, the majority of the artisans and skilled workers were Muslims.
- The worst catastrophe for the jute industry was the partition, which forced the evacuation of almost 80% of jute production to east Pakistan.
consequences of geography
- the disappearance of the area’s natural resources, like as its forests, the enormous Sunderbans delta mangroves, and its productive agricultural land (in this case, a large area under the jute crop).
- Water resource sharing between higher and lower riparian nations
- Flat alluvial plains and river deltas serve as the border’s distinguishing characteristics in border disputes.
- The freshly independent states are connected by a subpar transportation and communication network.
- Global significance of border communities’ infrastructure deficits in local, national, and international trade and commerce
- The wide-ranging implications of the stupid land divide immediately affect geopolitical conditions.
- A practical foreign policy and the solving of outstanding issues, including as the sharing of water, border management, border dispute resolution, and dissolution of terrorist organisations, are crucial for the subcontinent to achieve lasting peace.
Conclusion
- The current state of relations between the two nations is far from ideal. Given that both countries possess nuclear weapons, Kashmir is a problem. The “Islamization” of society in Pakistan in the 1980s exposed non-Muslim minorities, and Indian Muslims are frequently charged with harbouring Pakistani allegiances. More than a billion people are still experiencing problems as a result of Partition seven decades later.
Q2. Nehru favoured the idea of conserving indigenous people’s customs and identities while integrating them into Indian civilization. Elucidate. (250 words)
Paper & Topic: GS I – National Movement
Introduction:
- The government focused its efforts on integrating the tribes on preserving their distinctive social and cultural legacy. As stated by Jawaharlal Nehru, who had a significant influence on how the government felt about the tribals, the first issue we have to address there [in the tribal areas] is to inspire them [the tribal people] with confidence and to make them feel at one with India, as well as to realise that they are part of India and have an honoured place in it. But at the same time, “India should symbolise to them not just a guarding power but a liberating force.” Nehru said tribal people’s uniqueness could be accepted within the context of Indian nationalism.
Body:
One of Nehru’s goals was to integrate native Indians into society:
- There were basically two schools of thought regarding how indigenous people should be treated inside Indian civilization. One tactic was to essentially ignore the native population and prevent it from being impacted by modern culture, enabling it to continue in its present form.
- Assimilation into Indian society as quickly as possible was the second tactic. Instead of being mourned, the loss of the tribal way of life should be celebrated as a symbol of their “upliftment.”
- Jawaharlal Nehru rejected both of these methods. According to him, the first tactic is to view the tribal people as “museum specimens to be studied and written about.”
- He suggested that the level of isolation the native population currently has from the outside world could not be maintained.
- The outer world had already gotten too close at this point, rendering isolation neither desirable nor practical.
- The second plan, which suggested allowing them “be absorbed by the bulk of Indian humanity” or absorbing them by using conventional outside forces, was likewise untrue in Nehru’s opinion.
- This would entail losing the tribal people’s social and cultural identity as well as many of their positive traits.
- Because it permitted tribal people to retain their own identities and traditions while becoming an essential part of the Indian country, Nehru preferred this technique above the other two.
Nehru’s tribal Panchsheel policy:
- The Nehruvian plan includes crucial elements like “The tribal areas must develop, and they must do it in their own unique manner.
- ” As some might argue, progress wasn’t only “an attempt to duplicate what we have in other regions of India.” The rest of India would “gradually accept” them for everything good.
- The Tribal Panchsheel, also referred to as the five pillars of tribal policy, was founded by Jawaharlal Nehru and consists of the following:
- People should be allowed to develop in accordance with their own distinctive genius rather than being compelled to adhere to other values.
- Indigenous people’s rights to their lands and forests must be respected.
- Tribal groups ought to obtain training in development and administrative tasks.
- In indigenous communities, there shouldn’t be a lot of administration or programmes.
- Results should be evaluated in light of the development of human character rather than in terms of numbers or monetary expenses.
Conclusion:
- The nationalist treatment of tribal people that had been in place since Gandhiji encouraged gainful employment and built ashrams in the tribal areas in the 1920s served as the foundation for Nehru’s plan. The first president of independent India, Rajendra Prasad, and other significant political personalities supported this tactic.
