Integration and Merger of Indian States

Integration and Merger of Indian States

• Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel and V.P. Menon played the most important role in the integration and merger of Indian States.
• The main objective of shaping the Indian States into sizeable or viable administrative units was sought to be achieved by a three-fold process of integration (known as the 'Patel Scheme' after Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Minister-in-charge of Home Affairs)—

1. 216 states were merged into respective Provinces, geographically contiguous (connected) to them.

• These merged states were included in the territories of the states in Part B in the First Schedule of the constitution.
• The process of merger started with the merger of Orissa and Chhattisgarh States with the then Province of Orissa on January 1, 1948.

2. 61 states were converted into centrally administered areas and included in Part C of the First Schedule of the Constitution.

3. The third form of integration was the consolidation of groups of states into new viable units, known as Union of States.

• As many as 275 states were integrated into 5 Unions—Madhya Bharat, Patiala and East Punjab States Union, Rajasthan, Saurashtra and Travancore-Cochin. These were included in the States in Part B of the First Schedule.
• The other three States included in Part B were- Hyderabad, Jammu and Kashmir and Mysore.
• Jammu and Kashmir acceded to India on October 26, 1947, and so it was included as a state in Part B but the Government of India agreed to take the accession subject to confirmation by the people of the state, and a Constituent Assembly of J & K. The Constituent Assembly subsequently confirmed it in November, 1956. Thereafter, Constitution of Jammu & Kashmir was drafted which came into force on the 26 January, 1957. Earlier on 15 February 1954 the assembly (State assembly) members who were present cast a unanimous vote ratifying the state's accession to India.
• Hyderabad did not formally accede to India, but the Nizam issued a Proclamation recognising the necessity of entering into a constitutional relationship with the Union of India and accepting the Constitution of India subject to ratification by the Constituent Assembly of the State, and the Constituent Assembly of that state ratified this.

• It is noteworthy here that the Rajpramukhs of the five Unions as well as the Rulers of Hyderabad, Mysore Jammu and Kashmir all adopted the Constitution of India, by Proclamations.
• The process of integration culminated in the Constitution (7^th Amendment) Act, 1956, which abolished Part B states as a class and included all the states in Part A and B in one list.
• The special provisions in the constitution relating to Part B states were, consequently omitted. The Indian States thus lost their identity and become an uniform political organisation embodied in the Constitution of India.