Has the modern Indian state, called India, been limited in meeting the "cause" for which it was created? Or has it actually served the "real" cause?
What then is the "cause" ?
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| Political Map of the Indian Empire, 1893" from Constable's Hand Atlas of India, London: Archibald Constable and Sons, 1893. |
I therefore seek answers, and if any one can answer (not with opinion but with facts), I would be extremely thankful.
Have all communities benefited equally in modern and post-colonial Indian?
(A community is a small or large social unit (a group of people) who have something in common, such as norms, religion, values, or identity. Communities often share a sense of place that is situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, town, or neighborhood) or in virtual space through communication platforms.)
Which human communities have benefited the most and which the least -socio-economically in modern India?
Has any community's development and progress been actually limited due to the creation of the modern Indian State?
Has any community in modern India actually benefited at the cost of backwardness of any other Indian community?
Are there any communities in modern India that have suffered for the sake of prosperity and development of other communities? If yes, then which are those communities?
Which communities in modern India are the poorest and least developed?
Are such deprived and backward communities scattered randomly across modern India or are these domcile to specific regions or states?
Has there been policies that have led to unequal development within modern India? If yes, then why were such policies adopted?
Are there policies that have benefitted only select human communities within India? If yes, then which are these policies and which are the beneficiary communities?
Which are the most poor, underdeveloped and backward regions in modern India? Why are these regions so poor, underdeveloped and backward? Further..are the underdeveloped and backward regions lacking in terms of natural resources?
These regions that are poor, underdeveloped and backward, is it in any way because of the creation of the modern Indian state? Would these (poor, underdeveloped and backward) regions and their domicile communities been better off had they not been a part of the modern Indian state? Conversely, would the the modern Indian state been better off without these (poor, underdeveloped and backward) regions and their domicile communities?
How does the income and wealth distribution pyramid look like in modern India? Is a such a pyramidal distribution of wealth and income uniform in dimension across India, or does it vary from region to region/state to state? If it vaires, then why does it vary?
What are the factors that led to the formation of the modern Indian State - in its present form & shape?
Why post 15 August 1947, the modern Indian state continues to remain based on the colonial administrative structure - the very structure from which freedom was being sought?
Why wasn't the Indian sub-continent, post 15 August 1947 restored to a similar provincial and local administrative structure that was under the Mughals, the one that existed prior to British colonization of India?
Why did the princely states (non-British portion of the Indian sub-continent) integrate with the former British controlled territories to form the modern Indian State?
Have the people of the sub-continent truly benefitted from the creation of the modern Indian state - in its current colonial inspired form and structure?
Between Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh and Bhutan people from which region(s) are better off in terms of their human development index?
Have many communities within the border of India, since the formation of the modern state of India, for the development of India become second class clitizens in their own native-lands and socio-cultural settings?
Wasn't it the British East India Company that took away fertile and multi-cultural agricultural lands under organic farming in the Indian subcontinent and put it produce mmono-cultural cash crops like opium and indigo? Weren't the famine a result of such trade practices?
Wasn't it the British East India company that eventually put together the colonial governance structure (on which would be based the future modern Indian State) so that it was even more convenient for the company to exploit the rich resources of this vast sub-continent? Wasn't it the British who who set up the controversial "British Land Acquisition Act of 1894", which then made it legally & legitimately possible for the Colonial British Indian Government not be bound to provide any compensation to the displaced people except cash compensation?
Nearly nine decades later in 1984, hasn't the modern Indian State (which had inherited and as well as adopted the British Land Acquisition Act of 1894 as its own) modified it suitably with more provisions to displace internal people and their habitat?
Why is there still no federal policy or legal framework to deal with internally displaced people in the modern State of India. In fact, India doesn’t know how many internally displaced people are in the country. The 'Norwegian Refugee Council' puts the figure for 2015 at more than 560,000, while the 'Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre' placed it at least 853,900 people being displaced by violence in India.
Without a law to deal with internally displaced people, don't these unfortunate people end up being the "nowhere" people with no state wanting to accommodate them because they eat into development funds meant for a state's local residents, and thus leaving them vulnerable to exploitation?
Hasn't the structure of the modern Indian State been inspired by the preceding colonial governance structure that was purely to support the mercantile needs of the British East India Company? If that is so then why was such a governance structure not discontinued? And conversely, why wasn't a governance structure not designed that would focus on equal development of all human communities within the Indian State and not on furthering mercantile needs of a chosen few.
So, I come back to where I began - Has the modern south-Asian state, called 'Bhārat Gaṇarājya', failed to serve the "cause" for which it was created? Or has it actually served the "real" cause for which it was created in its present form?
What then is the "cause" ?
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Disclaimer: My writings have no pretensions neither to infallibility. not to omniscience. There may well be facts that I could be unaware of, that could undermine or discredit some of my arguments.
