Fundamentalism and the Sikh Religious Tradition by T.N. Madan

In 1929 when Shri Jawahar Lal Nehru was the President, a formal resolution was
passed by the Indian National Congress at Lahore" that no constitution of India would be
finalised, until it was acceptable to the Sikhs. The second assurance was the clear
statement of Nehru in 1946 that there was nothing objectionable in the Sikhs having an
area demarcated in the North-West of India, where they could enjoy the 'glow of
freedom'. It was a significant statement, since it was given in the context of Jinnah's
offering to the Sikhs constitutional guarantees in a separate state in the Eastern part of the
contemplated Pakistan." Third, there was the statement of Mahatma Gandhi, saying that
his words should be accepted and that the Congress would never betray any one, and that
if they did, the Sikhs knew how to use their Kirpan (sword). Finally, there was the
statement of Nehru in the Constituent Assembly in December, 1946, while proposing a
federal system with autonomous states. He moved the executive resolution, which
envisaged "The Indian Union as an independent sovereign republic comprising
autonomous units with residuary, powers, wherein the ideals of social, political and
economic democracy, would be guaranteed to all sections of the people, and adequate
safeguards would be provided for minorities, backward communities and areas," Nehru
described the resolution as a "Declaration, a pledge and an undertaking before the world,
a contract of millions of Indians, and therefore, in the nature of an oath which we mean to
keep."
An important fact is that the Congress had consistently been making two policy
statements, first, that India would be reorganised on a linguistic basis, 'and, second, that
the Indian constitution would be Federal in its structure, with states being largely
autonomous.
(b) After 1947 : After 1947, to the surprise and dismay of the Sikhs, the
Congress completely changed its stand. When the Akalis approached the Home Minister,
Sardar Patel, for the creation of a Punjabi Suba, his reply, as described by Prime Minister
Charan Singh, was, "I am ready to concede it. But you will have only that much land that
falls in your share on grounds of population. So Punjab area will be halved. Now you
form 17% of the Army. They will have to be dismissed. Are you prepared for it ?" This
opened the eyes of Sikh leaders, but it was too late. In 1949, when the draft constitution
was circulated to the State Assemblies, all the Sikh Members of the Punjab Legislative
Assembly unanimously rejected it, saying, "It has been the declared policy of the
Congress that India is to be a union of autonomous states, and each unit is to develop in
its own way, linguistically, culturally and socially. Of course. Defence, Communications
and Foreign Affairs must remain the Central Subjects. To change the basic policy now, is
to run counter to the oft-repeated creed of the Congress... In the considered opinion of the
Akali Dal the residuary powers should be with the states... The list distributing legislative
power should be based on the principle that the Centre or the Union Parliament should be
limited to Defence, Communication and Foreign Affairs only." But the Centre-went
ahead and adopted a centralised constitution. In protest the Akali representives in
Constituent Assembly declined to sign it.
Thus started the agitation for an autonomous Punjabi speaking state in which the
Sikhs happened to be in a majority. The Centre did constitute a States Reorganisation
Commission in 1956 for the purpose of creating linguistic states. It recommended the
formation of unilingual provinces in the entire country, except in the North West India,
i.e. the Punjab. Following its recommendations, instead of forming a Punjabi speaking