Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Carving up the South
While the chaos of Partition was mostly felt in the north - mainly in Punjab and Bengal -
the south faced problems of its own. Following Independence, the princely states and Brit-
ish provinces were dismantled and South India was reorganised into states along linguistic
lines. Though most of the princely states acceded to India peacefully, an exception was that
of the Nizam of Hyderabad. He wanted Hyderabad to join Islamic Pakistan, although only
he and 10% of his subjects were Muslims. Following a time of violence between Hindu and
Islamic hardliners, the Indian army moved in and forcibly took control of Hyderabad state
in 1949.
The Wodeyars in Mysore, who also ruled right up to Independence, were pensioned off.
But they were so popular with their subjects that the maharaja became the first governor of
the post-Independence state of Mysore. The boundaries of Mysore state were redrawn on
linguistic grounds in 1956, and the extended Kannada-speaking state of Greater Mysore
was established, becoming Karnataka in 1972.
Kerala, as it is today, was created in 1956 from Travancore, Cochin (now Kochi) and
Malabar (formerly part of the Madras Presidency). The maharajas in both Travancore and
Cochin were especially attentive to the provision of basic services and education, and their
legacy today is India's most literate state. Kerala also blazed a trail in post-Independence
India by becoming the first state in the world to freely elect a communist government in
1957.
Andhra Pradesh was declared a state in 1956, having been created by combining Andhra
state (formerly part of the Madras Presidency) with parts of the Telugu-speaking areas of
the old Nizam of Hyderabad's territory.
Tamil Nadu emerged from the old Madras Presidency, although until 1969 Tamil Nadu
was known as Madras State. In 1956, in a nationwide reorganisation of states, it lost
Malabar district and South Canara to the fledgling state of Kerala on the west coast.
However, it also gained new areas in Trivandrum (now Thiruvananthapuram) district in-
cluding Kanyakumari. In 1960, 1049 sq km of land in Andhra Pradesh was exchanged for a
similar amount of land in Salem and Chengalpattu districts.
The creation of Maharashtra was one of the most contested issues of the language-based
demarcation of states in the 1950s. After Independence, western Maharashtra and Gujarat
were joined to form Bombay state, but in 1960, after agitation by pro-Marathi supporters,
