New Delhi: Nearly seven years after his government declared Chandigarh as the capital of the torn and truncated state of Punjab, Jawaharlal Nehru was on a visit to the emerging town in 1957.
In a speech delivered in the city, Nehru said, “Punjab had gone through a traumatic experience due to Partition. It was a wounded state…It had sustained a physical and emotional injury. The blows inflicted by one’s own brother go very deep, and it is difficult to heal them. It was essential to do something to heal that wound. The wounded spirit needed a soothing balm. Taking all this into account, it was felt that the people of Punjab, with their hearts and minds, should look forward in a new direction.”
Chandigarh, Nehru believed, was this new direction. “Chandigarh was in more ways than one a panacea for the wound that had been inflicted on Punjab,” he said. “It would show that Punjab has not been crushed by this blow, that Punjab is once again on the move. Chandigarh is a symbol of this spirit and image.”
Last week, as the Centre proposed bringing Chandigarh under Article 240 of the Constitution—which would empower the President to frame regulations and legislate directly for the Union Territory—a political hue and cry ensued in Punjab. All political parties, except for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), raised an alarm. This was yet another move by New Delhi to diminish Punjab’s claim over Chandigarh, the city meant to be the state’s “soothing balm”, parties claimed.
Even BJP leaders privately raised concerns. According to reports, Punjab BJP president Sunil Jakhar spoke to Union Home Minister Amit Shah late Saturday, with the Centre beating a hasty retreat after. It “clarified” that the proposal was still under consideration and that it had no intention of introducing any Bill to this effect in the upcoming session of Parliament in December.
“Chandigarh is an integral part of Punjab, and the Punjab BJP stands firmly with the interests of the state, whether it is the issue of Chandigarh or the waters of Punjab. Whatever confusion arose regarding Chandigarh will be resolved by discussing it with the government. As a Punjabi myself, I assure you that for us, Punjab always comes first,” Jakhar said Sunday, emphasising the emotional significance of Chandigarh for Punjabis.
With the question of who controls Chandigarh—Punjab, or Punjab jointly with Haryana, or the Centre—becoming a political issue again, ThePrint explains why, for decades, Chandigarh, along with Punjab’s claims over it, has been a politically charged and emotionally raw issue for Punjabis.
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‘The crowning glory of Punjab’
At the birth of Independent India, the Sikhs, particularly the Akali Dal leadership, felt three major blows. First, the violence and displacement of Partition. Second, the loss of Punjab’s cultural-economic heart of Lahore that also symbolised Sikh political strength. And third, the bitter understanding that—as a religious minority—they stood little chance of ruling through a democratic majority.
With the creation of Chandigarh, Nehru sought to address the first two blows.
The loss of Lahore was followed by animated discussions on a new capital city for the Indian Punjab. Amritsar, Jalandhar, Ludhiana, and Ambala were all in the reckoning. But a few people, including Nehru, wanted an entirely new city to be the capital of Punjab.
In the speech mentioned earlier in this report, Nehru had also said, “It was felt that to build a new city to be the capital of the Punjab would give the people something new to look forward to. We wanted them to look to the future with new hope after the trauma that they had been through. We felt that the new capital would be a symbol of new hope.”
In March 1948, the Government of Punjab, in consultation with the Centre, approved the foothills of the Shivaliks as the site for the new capital. The Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier, with a team of English and Swiss architects of impeccable repute, arrived and began to, in Nehru’s words, “erect a finely planned city which should be an example to others”.
The process of building an entirely new type of city from scratch began at great expense for the cash-strapped governments at the Centre and in Punjab. Yet, for both Nehru and Punjab, Chandigarh’s political and emotional significance far outweighed the financial costs borne for building it.
For Nehru, along with the Bhakra-Nangal dam, Chandigarh was to be the “crowning glory of Punjab”. “… we wanted to show the world that even at a time when we had been severely wounded, we had the spirit and daring to take up such big projects, and having taken them up, to finish them successfully. Chandigarh and Bhakra have proved to be the crowning glory of Punjab,” he said in 1957.
Almost as a perfect symbol of Nehruvian planning, Chandigarh became the first Indian city to be planned from scratch. “We wanted it to be not only aesthetically beautiful but to have modern comforts and good working and living conditions, and a number of other things, which the city planners in the olden days did not understand,” Nehru said.
“For instance, the location of schools is an important matter. The children should not have to go very far or cross busy thoroughfares. Then, there should be shopping malls in every part of the city.”
All the resources for this perfectly planned city came from Punjab, says political scientist A.S. Narang. “It was an entirely new city, and copious amounts of money were spent on building it,” he said. “All of this came from Punjab. Of course, at the time, Haryana was also part of Punjab, but the rich parts of the state from which resources could be drawn were in Punjab…Haryana’s region was too backward, and also too neglected, to contribute,” he added. “Therefore, Punjabis continue to feel that Chandigarh rightfully belongs to them.”
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‘Loss’ of Chandigarh
While Chandigarh was being built with gusto, the third blow felt by the Akalis was playing out in the backdrop—the realisation that they could never come to power in a democratic setting in a state where Sikhs were a minority. “In the 50s, the Akalis realised that they could never come to power in a Hindu majority state, and it was too late to ask for a Sikh homeland,” K.B.S. Sidhu, a retired IAS officer from Punjab, tells ThePrint. “Language became the fig-leaf for their politics.”
While the reorganisation of states along linguistic lines happened in 1956, Punjabis were not given a linguistic state of their own. The denial of a Punjabi-speaking state, therefore, gave the Akalis a raison d’etre in the new political framework. And thus began the Punjabi Suba movement for a new, further truncated Punjab.
The movement continued for over a decade till 1966, when the state of Punjab was finally trifurcated on linguistic lines into Punjab, Haryana, and Himachal Pradesh. As Sikhs became the majority in the new Punjab, the Akalis could finally hope to come to power.
However, the Punjab they got was hardly the Punjabi Suba they had fought for. “It totally backfired for Punjab,” says Sidhu. “The Punjabi-speaking areas of Ambala, Kalka, Pinjore, Chandigarh, Karnal, Una, Dalhousie, and parts of Ganganagar were not included in the Punjabi Suba,” he adds.
“While the demand was for a Punjabi state, what Indira Gandhi gave was essentially a Sikh-majority state. Punjab, which had surrounded Delhi by 270 degrees, lost the border with the capital to Haryana. It lost the hills and natural resources to Himachal Pradesh. Its river water had to, now, be divided,” he says.
Yet, the gravest loss for Punjab was the loss of the exclusive claim over Chandigarh. Under the Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966, the city assumed the unique distinction of being the capital of both Punjab and Haryana, even as it was declared a Union Territory and placed under the Centre’s direct control.
“You see, the Boundary Commission that had been set up had recommended that Chandigarh should be given to Haryana because it falls in the Kharar region, which was mostly Hindi-speaking,” says Narang. “However, the Centre came up with this unique arrangement, which effectively passed on the control of Chandigarh to the Centre…For Punjabis, this was an affront.”
A new movement
Fresh agitations followed.
Sant Fateh Singh, who, following Master Tara Singh, had just taken over the leadership of the Akali Dal, began a hunger strike—first in 1965 and then again in 1966—demanding that Chandigarh be handed over to Punjab. During the second fast, in an attempt to escalate pressure on the Centre, he arranged for an agnikund on the roof of a house adjacent to the Akal Takht, publicly vowing to burn himself alive if his demands were ignored.
Eventually, though, he abandoned the fast after receiving the Centre’s assurances, which, later, were revealed to be untrue. Immediately after, he lost all legitimacy, as angry Sikhs accused him of saving his life without attaining the promised goal. Wherever he went, Fateh Singh faced the taunt: “Why are you still alive?”
Darshan Singh Pheruman, another prominent Sikh leader, then entered the scene. In 1969, he began a fast unto death, swearing that he would not be a “coward”, like Fateh Singh. After 74 days of fasting, he died for the cause of Chandigarh.
The Centre was caught in a bind. It considered several options, including dividing the city of Chandigarh, which proved to be unfeasible. So, it began to tilt towards Punjab and asked the Haryana government to use the office and residential accommodation in Chandigarh only for five years till it shifted to its new capital. It even offered the new state Rs 10 crore as a grant and the same amount as a loan to build its own capital.
On 29 January 1970, nearly three years after Haryana came into being, the Centre issued a formal communication in this regard. According to the Centre’s note submitted to the Lok Sabha, it was said, “After very carefully weighing the claims of the two states, the capital project area of Chandigarh should, as a whole, go to Punjab.”
In 1971–72, Indira Gandhi once again promised Chandigarh to Punjab. But her ‘award’ came at a price: the surrender of Fazilka-Abohar and other Hindi-speaking tracts to Haryana. This proved to be a stalemate. “These areas do not share a border with Haryana, so for them to be given to Haryana required that a corridor be created cutting through Punjab,” says Narang. “So, the whole demand got lost in these conditions and ifs and buts.”
Since then, the Centre has repeatedly stated that Chandigarh will eventually be given to Punjab. Until June 1984, the UT of Chandigarh had a Chief Commissioner, a senior civil servant reporting directly to Delhi. But that system was dismantled on the eve of Operation Blue Star, Sidhu wrote in his blog.
The Governor of Punjab was then given additional charge as Administrator of Chandigarh; the Chief Commissioner was redesignated as Adviser to the Administrator. Thereby, Punjab received the assurance that even as Chandigarh remained a UT, it belonged more to Punjab than to Haryana.
“The Governor’s dual role became a daily reminder that Chandigarh was, and is, Punjab’s capital first, even if it serves Haryana and the Union, as well,” writes Sidhu.
In 1985, Rajiv Gandhi sought to consolidate this assurance in the historic Punjab Accord with the popular Sikh leader and Shiromani Akali Dal president Sant Harchand Singh Longowal.
The accord stated, “The Capital Project Area of Chandigarh will go to Punjab. Some adjoining areas, which were previously part of Hindi or Punjabi regions, were included in the Union Territory. With the Capital region going to Punjab, the areas which were added to the Union Territory from the Punjabi region of the erstwhile state of Punjab will be transferred to Punjab and those from the Hindi region to Haryana. The entire Sukhna Lake will thus go to Punjab.”
However, on 26 January 1986, Chaudhary Devi Lal’s massive demonstration reached the Parliament House, opposing the move. Rajiv Gandhi, thereafter, backtracked, and the stalemate remained.
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The present situation
In his blog, Sidhu explains, “Today, Chandigarh is governed through a more layered mechanism. Parliament extends suitable Punjab laws to the Union Territory or enacts specific legislation for it. This is time-consuming and sometimes clumsy, but it does one crucial thing: it forces a measure of parliamentary debate. Punjab’s MPs can object, negotiate, demand amendments, or at least put their protest on record.”
Over the years, successive governments have maintained the status quo regarding Chandigarh, and three reasons are behind it, explained Narang. “Firstly, as soon as the Akalis come to power, they abandon the causes which they agitate over when out of power. This includes Chandigarh. Secondly, the Congress, and now the BJP, are pulled in opposite directions because they cannot anger their own party units in either Punjab or Haryana by siding with one state,” he says. “And thirdly, people of Chandigarh have developed vested interests in letting the city be a UT, in perpetuity, as that means rule of the bureaucracy, which is often more efficient than that by an assembly.”
People on both sides of the border have come to terms with the fact that Chandigarh might remain a UT perpetually, even as Punjabis can claim symbolic victory that successive governments have validated their claim over Chandigarh, he adds.
The Centre’s Bill disrupts that precarious balance, he says. “That is why even the Punjab BJP was caught in an awkward situation because the party cannot hope to grow there, independently, if they antagonise Punjabis over such a sentimental issue.”
The Bill, if it sees the light of day, would mean “losing even the thin, indirect line of influence that currently runs through parliamentary procedures,” wrote Sidhu. “Law for the city will largely come by presidential regulation, drafted in North Block, notified in the Gazette, and implemented by a bureaucracy that does not answer to Chandigarh’s residents or to Punjab’s legislature.”
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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