Mr Patel’s Lesson in Handling the Royals

A Kadir Jasin

بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمَنِ الرَّحِيم

PREAMBLE: Views expressed herein are entirely mine. I am writing in my personal capacity as a blogger. It has nothing to do with whatever position I may hold.

Patel helped unified independent India

IN 1946, the Malay masses rallied under the leadership of the Johorian Datuk Onn Jaafar to save the Malay Rulers from the deception of the British.

Knowing that they had lost the respect of the Malayans following their humbling defeat by the Japanese in the Second World War, the British knew that their only hope of re-establishing themselves in Malaya was to bring the Sultans to their side.

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They knew that only by using the Malays rulers, the Malay customs and the religion of Islam that they stood a chance of imposing their hegemony over Malaya once again.

Hence they proposed the formation of the Malayan Union that put the Malay states on par with their full-pledged colonies the Straits Settlements – Singapore, Malacca and Penang. These territories were once owned by the Malay Sultans.

In that manner, their grips over Malaya became stronger than before their defeat.

The first to agree to the proposal by Harold Alfred McMichael was the anglophile Maharaja of Johor. He was followed joyfully by other rulers and reluctantly one or two.

Incidentally Sultan Sir Ibrahim Al Masyhur Ibni Almarhum Sultan Abu Bakar Al-Khalil Ibrahim Shah was also the one to oppose the independence of Malaya. He died in London in 1959.

At the time when the Malay teachers, farmers, fishermen and tradesmen were opposing the Malayan Union in order to preserve the Malay royalties and thwart the British insidious scheme, the newly independent India was dismantling its monarchies.

Apart from partition, communal riots and a refugee crisis, the independent government of India in 1946 found itself grappling with the task of integrating nearly 600 princely states into the Indian republic.

As everywhere in the world that it ruled, the British left a whole mess in India. One of which was the Indian royals who they once used to lord over the Indian masses.

In came the famous Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, India’s first Home Minister who was also the deputy to Jawaharlal Nehru, the Prime Minister.

He was given the task of “negotiating” with the rulers of 562 princely states – the maharajas, rajas, shahs, sultans, nawabs and you name it.

This isn’t a new story anyway – at least not for me. I had told this story before – during the two constitutional crises we had – 1983 and 1993.

Mr Patel was stoic and simple in habits. He was a man of few words but when he spoke, people listened, which was why he was given the formidable task of integrating the princely states.

Back then, the princely states covered 48% of the area of pre-Independent India and constituted 28% of its population.

While these kingdoms were not legally a part of British India but in reality they were completely subordinate to the British Crown. This story of subjugation using the royalties also happened in British Malaya.

The Indian Independence Act of 1947, which was part of the Mountbatten Plan, provided for the lapse of supremacy of the British Crown over the Indian states.

It also gave each of these rulers the option to accede to the newly born Indian republic or to Pakistan, or continue as independent sovereign states.

Realising the need to get these 500-odd chiefdoms to accede to India before the day of independence, Patel and his secretary, Menon, began using all the tricks in the bag – including force and friendly coercion – to achieve the integration.

But the process was far from simple. Mollycoddled as well as exploited by the British for decades, many of the rulers saw the departure of the British as the ideal moment to declare autonomy and announce their independence.

From invoking the patriotism of the princes to reminding them of the possibility of anarchy in the event that they refused to join, he kept trying to convince them to become part of India.

He also introduced the concept of “privy purses” – a payment to be made to royal families for their agreement to merge with India.

Patel’s tireless efforts paid off when most of the rulers agreed to the dissolution of their respective states, surrendering control of thousands of villages, jagirs, palaces, institutions, cash and a railway system of about 12,000 miles to the Indian government without receiving any compensation.

By 15 August 1947, the process of integration of princely states was almost complete except for a few, who held out.

To rein them in, Patel used anything from threat to coercion and, some said, outright bribery. After the carrots, came the big stick. The army was used to gain the surrender of some belligerent royals.

Stories were told of Patel’s shrewdness. When some recalcitrant rulers refused to continue negotiations, he cut the electricity supply to their mansions. They sweated it out. But when he cut the water supply and the mansions stink, they returned to the negotiating table.

Thus, the ever-pragmatic Patel and his brilliant secretary (Menon) accomplished the monumental task of unifying the princely states into the Indian union.

Article 1 of the Indian Constitution states that “India, that is Bharat, shall be a Union of States”, and there is no person who can claim greater credit for the creation of modern India than Sardar Vallabhai Patel.

The Indian lesson continuous to be relevant to all nations, that still have the hereditary constitutional rulers.

ENDS.