Impacts Of Statehood Demand

Political statements and realities: 

KalimNews, Kalimpong, 27 September 2013: The current chief minister of West Bengal knows about the fact that the Darjeeling and Dours would become a new state in coming days. However, due to political complexities and situation she is bound to give statements based on political advantage. She has to show off her stiff attitude to retain her presence in West Bengal politics by pleasing ruling fronts, different minority groups etc. as vote banks. As in this case I believe when she visited Kalimpong on Sept 3rd 2013 to receive the highest award ‘Kingchum Daarmit’ from The Indigenous Lepcha Tribal Association, when the whole Darjeeling district was quiet and the streets were abandoned and alienated as if there would be an alien attack, in such scenario she must have had the thought that one day she will be called again to be facilitated as a guest of honour in the same place but in another state of Darjeeling and Dours. There was desperation and anxiety in her speech. She could sense a wind of change in the hills of Darjeeling. Nevertheless, in Mela ground she managed to sing the same old tunes that “Bengal will not be divided”. 

During World War II in a military operation few soldiers (US allies) were captured somewhere in Korea and were kept in underground prison. They were given food and water supplies within a bamboo cell of 10’x10’. Everyday some or the other person comes and tells them that America is defeated – many soldiers were captured or killed. Soldiers were pathetic thinking that they have lost the war. After four years of imprisonment there was a swap between two countries in exchanging war captives. Those soldiers were also the part of the swap only to realise that the war was over two years back and the US had won the war. For these years they were told the lie and the same lie had become the ultimate truth for them. Unless they were freed to see the light of the day, they would remain in the same arrogant lie. 

As in the case of Bihar, Mr Lalu Prasad the then Chief Minister had made a political statement that Bihar will not be divided, and if this happens, it will be over his dead body. With this statement Lalu could please the crowd and certain sections of his political allies that he would never let the division happen by way of formation of a new state. Infact, he had delivered this message keeping in view the vote banks and wanted to instil the message that Bihar will never be bifurcated as long as he lives. And what we saw was the state of Jharkhand carved out of Bihar as it was constitutional and no one could interfere whatsoever, when the rightful had to be delivered to this area. Now the same kind of notes are being aired in West Bengal that “Bengal will not be divided”, this needs to be understood by the reader of this article with the previous context because the demand for Darjeeling and Dours State (D&DS) is constitutional. This aspect is invoked in the Article 3 (c): ‘to reduce the territory of the State by creating a new state’. So, if a new state is created than automatically the area would be decreased. Perhaps it is ‘creation’, not the ‘division’ as far as the Article 3 (c) is concerned about a new state formation.  Therefore, it should not be addressed as division.  To comply this legal aspect of the constitution for the right to demand a state, it is the right of the people of Darjeeling and Dours to demand self-determination within the territorial boundaries of a state. The legal right for the demand of our area were specified in the Act of 1935 as Partially Excluded Areas and the same has been transferred with the safeguard within the Provision of Fifth Schedule of the Constitution. 

May be Ms Banerjee has much complexities in dealing the present situation of the hills and the only option she has is to give the political statement in order to gain the confidence of her government in the state. Every political party would always like to be in a favourable state as far as the vote bank is concerned in order to achieve short or long term benefit. Even the centre is looking for a prime time to initiate the constitutional process even when the rightful has to be delivered, and it looks like Union Territory (UT) is the current provision for the region of Darjeeling and Dours which is in the mind of centre.

Just an f.y.i (for your information), language is not the only determining factor for the formation of a state. When language gets recognised and incorporated into the eight schedule of the constitution does not necessarily back up the sole criteria for the new state creation. Yes, it would serve a great purpose in recognising, uplifting a community/culture, literature in the areas where it is spoken. Once there was a publication of an article written by a retired judge of one of the states of India, (published in TOI). He said on linguistic basis state can be formed applying article 3 of the constitution, which is not true at all, if any misinterpretation of such would lead people nowhere. Language is important and it plays a vital role in recognising a community as well as the state where the majority speakers are present. We need to understand where the language is applied, in the formation of the state probably when State Reorganisation Committee (SRC) initiates its survey to figure out the actual area of the proposed state then language criteria would help them to carve out the actual map of the state, i.e. total area to be included or excluded in a new state. Same formula has been used in the formation of different states in India in order to ascertain the actual area of a state in consent with the neighbouring states. Moreover, the State Reorganization Committee (SRC) commissioned by the Seventh (Amendment) Act 1956 is primed to focus on the wider aspects of determining the territorial boundaries of the new state. 

For example: there are two states West Bengal and Bihar. One of the bordering districts of West Bengal with Bihar is heavily populated with Bihari speaking people and in Bihar one of the bordering districts with Bengal has majority of Bengali people. As per the protocol Bengali speaking district is in Bihar and Bihari speaking district in WB, now what SRC does is the survey simply based on linguistic or other factor and may propose both the states in exchange of these districts or one of these to one another which would be in consultation with these states. So ultimately a new map of states will be created with the inclusion of those districts. So, what SRC does is the work of reorganising any state whether present or a new state in terms of its area (i.e. the actual map of the state). Now, we can clearly see that in West Bengal – Bengali is spoken and in Bihar – Bihari is spoken and in laymen’s term it looks like West Bengal belongs to Bengali, Bihar belongs to Bihari, that’s all. This way states in India is politically organised on linguistic basis and language is a unifying factor as far as the whole community is concerned. The only state which looks like created based on linguistic criteria earlier have to be bifurcated now as per the constitutional procedure, so looks like a correction. Shocking to know a person of such repute writing such an article, that too in one of the popular newspapers of the country.

On the same note: When retired Judge Santosh Hedge was relieved from the post of Lokayukta of Karnataka and there was a need to replace his post with a new Lokayukta. The Governor of the state and the selection committee were looking for a suitable candidate for the post of Lokayukta in the State (I’m writing this based on the series of TOI publication on this issue for about a month). The Lokayukta should probably be the retired high court Judge or of that rank. So, the ruling party came up with another name, after that there was a credential (background) check done by different medias and social groups and found the candidate who was to be appointed as a new Lokayukta had bought a plot of land in the city which was apparently not registered as per the land reform procedures – to say in simple term he didn’t follow the regulation for land registration which happened to be the talk of the town in many ways. Later he said over the media that when he bought the land he was not aware of the land registration act. This way he had to step down from the candidature as he couldn’t meet the credential for the post. So, we can figure out sometimes the regulators also fail to comply with the compliance. And I guess its human however, it requires a correction. 

The response given by Hillman the analyst in the NewsKalimpong for the article “Division of state not good for Hill People” was befitting and the person who wrote the said article is also happens to be the retired judge. What an irony? Or should I say: a will full blindness?

Social talks and opinions:

My friends from West Bengal especially from Calcutta they are very optimistic about the new state of D&DS. They say centre should have intervened long back in order to come to a solution. If a new state has to be formed as D&DS, let it be in peace, so that we will always have the mutual respect for each other. We love you people in the hills, we do not want any kind of strife arising between hills and the plains people. These are the simple lines of translation of what we have during friendly talks. Most of the citizens in the State have understood that D&DS is legitimate and they are in support of the new state.

The online Social Forums:

I’ve come across many online forums wherein the topic would be separate state. The forums and the interactions which I’ve googled so far are less useful from the prospective of a reader. People are writing in English (seems educated) but as we read the contents it is just a heated discussions, neither one can convince someone or explain what’s going on. The entire discussion of the forum has become some sort of confusion for the member readers as well as those who are accessing the forum regardless of communities or people. Sometimes I find write ups from other state communities which really makes sense, it shows that they did some research and showing up their concerns. Believe it or not some forums have become a mere Warfield, nobody wants to substantiate for what they are saying. I guess we should minimise these kinds of emotional, baseless talks, so as to make the discussions informative for the people. If we become logical and talk sense than others will have good impression and would find interest in knowing our culture, history and people.

In 2009 some of my friends from abroad had come to visit Darjeeling and happened to witness a large processions, streets filled with ethnical splendour of colourful dresses, while every participants singing and dancing in cultural tunes. When they were still taking photographs – the front portion of the crowd danced even with greater excitement. They enjoyed taking photographs and said they had never seen such a big ethnical procession in this magnitude. Later out of curiosity they asked about our demand and the cultural happenings.

Darjeeling people have a magical charm in dealing with people, culture and civilizations and are being loved by most of the people of the world. They say Darjeeling people look smart and friendly. They wear fancy clothes, speak good English, trustworthy are some of the comments I’ve heard from the people I’ve met so far. Positively speaking most of our people know how to groom themselves in order to look presentable, this may be the reason why we get noticed as unique individuals. Hence, Darjeeling as a place is not only famous in the world but also its inhabitants are seen as beautiful people.

Media impact:

While moving to the other parts of India some people ask me about Bimal Gurung - “how is he?” as if he knows him personally!!!!! Also some mention about late Madan Tamang. It is all because of the media and its impact. The statehood demand for D&DS has become so popular that even people know the name of our leaders easily as GK prompts (who’s who). Some says, it’s the oldest demand before India’s independence and even quote 1907. I love it and shake hands whenever they come up with some facts about our demand. Just imagine how many people use internet in India daily? And how many must have been accessing our news and facts online? Now we are in the age of technology and mass media, as and when the top news goes viral on the national Medias, most of the people try to dig up the same issue in the internet and some even do the research immediately. Mass media has educated most of the population in our country that our demand is legitimate, constitutional and started way back in 1907, if you do the math, it’s only 106 years old statehood demand in India. So, it is to say that whole country has heard about our demand and speaking for its solidarity during general discussions and the overall views of the masses is that the centre should intervene in order to form D&D State. On the similar note the Medias who has operations basically in Darjeeling has more role to play as far as the flow of information is concerned. People need right information and in the right way.

Impact on Darjeeling:

In the game of Chess the pawns goes first to make the necessary ground to have a strategic field for other pieces, while in the game there would be many sacrifices to be made by pawns and the pieces to win the game. Though sometimes we may consider that the pieces (the leaders) are the ones who contribute to the victory however, pawns (the masses) are also of great importance in the entire game of chess as they are the actual strength of democracy.

I remember the 40 days bandh without relaxation of previous agitation where in I along with my father went to get some provisions walking all the way to Sikkim. Many families suffered, special the families below poverty level. There were stories when people went to look for petty loans, they were misunderstood as if they are pretending to be a beggar and taking advantage of the situation. After all, who will believe a poor man in his fragile approach, clothed in some 2nd hand cloth with half torn shoes? There might have been fear or shy to share about the family conditions as one may ridicule or scold saying that everyone is facing the same situation which may not be true as far as this one is concerned. There was no solid reason for 40 days bandh and the saddest part of it was for the sake of DGHC.

The recent bandh for more than a month was different and peaceful, as it showcased the seriousness and dedication of the people of Darjeeling to the present movement of separate statehood demand. During the busy polity of Centre and State and the bandh called by the Gorkhaland Joint Action Committee in Darjeeling. The contributions made by the people of entire District is praise worthy,  the masses away from the main line politics have given the most in order to make it a success and proving the commitments of the hill people towards the demand of D&DS. On the other hand the people especially the families whose current hand to mouth situation was really a matter of great concern. Apparently, these little ones are always constant in the belief that one day they will have their own state, wherein there won’t be status discrimination neither the economical strife. Typical behaviour – almost no supplies still they manage to smile as if they are least bothered. Nevertheless, there is no shortfall in enthusiasm, no worries, they have become the real warriors with renewed vigour even amidst the harsh situations to stand for our cause. When British discovered Darjeeling, people might have been of the same mentality, though simple and poor, happy and always smiling, for which after British some took the advantage and declared themselves as the ruler and exploited the hills of its beauty and legal heir. Now the people have become immune to any odd situation and ready for another wave of cultural movement which is going on at present, let us be united even with greater zeal, we are approaching our destination. Let us encourage one another and be focused in all circumstances because time is near for us to smile in our own state.

(The writer is Paul Rai of Bangalore)