Demand for New States in India – UPSC

• Demand for new States once rested on the linguistic, cultural and ethnic composition of an area. Today it rests more on development and progress.
• Demands for smaller States continue, with development as the main basis and culture as a secondary factor.
  • Vidarbha shows the shift: its early case was cultural, while its present case is about development. Many read this as a healthier trend for the unity and sovereignty of India.
• The creation of Telangana in 2014 revived older demands and prompted new ones.

Why Smaller States Are Sought

The Case and Its Critics

• Size and administration: supporters argue that very large States are hard to govern fairly.
  • Uttar Pradesh is the usual example, with 19.98 crore people at Census 2011.
• An early voice: in a dissent to the 1955 report, K. M. Panikkar proposed a new Agra State from Uttar Pradesh, arguing that its size stood in the way of efficient administration.
  • B. R. Ambedkar quoted him with approval in Thoughts on Linguistic States (1955), which also proposed dividing Bihar in two.
• The counter-argument: opponents fear that repeated division would strengthen centrifugal forces, a theme of regional consciousness and national integration.

Principles for Judging a Demand

• The Fazl Ali Commission on State reorganisation weighed four factors in 1955: unity and security of India; linguistic and cultural homogeneity; financial, economic and administrative considerations; and planning and people’s welfare.
• Later discussion condenses the test for a new State into four kinds of viability:
  • Economic viability
  • Administrative viability
  • Ecological viability
  • Socio-ethnic viability

Basis of Formation of New States

• Physiographic character or distinctiveness: a strong factor behind many demands.
  • Uttarakhand is mountainous, Jharkhand a plateau and Chhattisgarh a basin.
• Level of economic development: a lack of industry, agrarian crisis and weak infrastructure push demand, on the belief that growth can be won despite these handicaps. Gorkhaland is an example.
• Resource base: a new State should be self-sustaining.
  • Tulu Nadu and Kodagu would struggle on this test.
  • The demands for Bundelkhand and Maru Pradesh rest on this factor.
• Ethnicity: cultural or social affiliation has been a main reason for new States.
  • Nagaland was created with tribal affiliation in view.
• Size of State or geographical area: a big State is harder to govern, which widens inequality within it.
  • The demands for Harit Pradesh in Uttar Pradesh and Maru Pradesh in Rajasthan rest on this ground.
• Tribalism or nature of society: the argument is that area-based and tribal planning need a unit of their own, as in Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand.

Demands Under Discussion

Uttar Pradesh and the Bundelkhand Region

• The four-State plan: the Uttar Pradesh Assembly passed a resolution by voice vote on 21 November 2011 to divide the State into Purvanchal, Bundelkhand, Awadh Pradesh and Paschim (Harit) Pradesh. The Centre did not take it forward.
  • In September 2026 a State minister spoke of a four-part division at a rally in Deoria. The Centre has confirmed no such plan.
• Harit Pradesh (Western Uttar Pradesh): a proposed State of 22 districts, formed by six divisions: Agra, Aligarh, Bareilly, Meerut, Moradabad and Saharanpur. Counts of 24 and 26 districts also appear, depending on the boundary drawn.
  • The issue dates from the 1950s and was revived in the 1990s by the Rashtriya Lok Dal, with Meerut as the proposed capital.
• Awadh Pradesh (Central Uttar Pradesh): about 21 districts, a transition zone between the western and eastern proposals, with Lucknow as its natural capital.
• Purvanchal (Eastern Uttar Pradesh): the eastern end of the State.
  • Limits: Nepal to the north, Bihar to the east, the Baghelkhand region of Madhya Pradesh to the south and the Awadh region to the west.
  • Cultural parts: the Awadhi region in the west, the Bhojpuri region in the east and the Baghelkhand region in the south.
  • Size and movement: 22 districts in the 2011 plan and 27 in wider versions, with a movement active from 1996 to 2002.
• Bundelkhand: a dry, under-developed zone across Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, with its own agro-climatic needs.
  • The Bahujan Samaj Party government of Chief Minister Mayawati proposed in 2011 a State of seven Uttar Pradesh districts.
  • The Bundelkhand Mukti Morcha, active on this since 1989, wants six Madhya Pradesh districts as well. A count of five also appears.
• Vindhya Pradesh: a former State of 23,603 sq miles (about 61,130 sq km), merged into Madhya Pradesh in 1956, whose revival is sought.
  • It was named after the Vindhya Range, which ran through its centre.
  • It lay between Uttar Pradesh to the north and Madhya Pradesh to the south, with the enclave of Datia to the west, surrounded by Madhya Bharat.

Western and Central India

• Vidarbha (Eastern Maharashtra): the Amravati and Nagpur divisions, 11 districts in all, a mineral- and forest-rich cotton belt marked by poverty.
  • The States Reorganisation Commission (1955) recommended a separate Vidarbha with Nagpur as capital.
  • The States Reorganisation Act, 1956 instead placed it in Bombay State, and it passed to Maharashtra, formed on 1 May 1960.
  • The Vidarbha Rajya Andolan Samiti seeks statehood by 2027, and protests were held in Nagpur on 1 May 2026.
• Saurashtra (Western Gujarat): a peninsula that was itself a Part B State until 1956.
  • Advocate Ratilal Tanna, a close aide of former Prime Minister Morarji Desai, started the movement in 1972.
  • The region is set apart by its Saurashtra (Kathiawadi) dialect.
• Konkan: a rugged stretch of India’s western coast, across the coastal districts of Maharashtra, Goa and Karnataka.
  • The proposed State takes in Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg of Maharashtra, the north and south districts of Goa, and Karwar up to Aghanashini in Karnataka.
• Bhil Pradesh: a tribal demand across Rajasthan, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra, traced to Govind Giri at Mangarh in 1913.
  • Claims vary between 43 and 49 districts. A large rally met at Mangarh Dham, Banswara, on 17 July 2025.

Eastern India

• Gorkhaland (Northern West Bengal): a proposed State for areas of the ethnic Gorkha (Nepali) people, the Darjeeling hills and the Dooars. It draws on an ethno-linguistic sentiment of Gorkha identity and on the region’s development.
  • 1907: the Hillmen’s Association sought separate administration.
  • 1986–88: the Gorkha National Liberation Front led a violent agitation of about 28 months, with over 1,200 deaths by one estimate. It ended with the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (1988).
  • 2007: the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha revived the demand. A pact of 18 July 2011 set up the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration, and a fresh agitation followed in 2017.
  • October 2025: Pankaj Kumar Singh was appointed interlocutor.
  • 22 August 2026: at a meeting near Siliguri, the Union Home Minister announced a high-level committee under the interlocutor to work on a “permanent political solution”. The interlocutor’s team met hill groups in Darjeeling on 9 October 2026.
• Greater Cooch Behar: Cooch Behar, Jalpaiguri, Darjeeling and adjoining north Bengal, with the old Goalpara tract of Assam. The former kingdom merged with India on 28 August 1949. The demand began in 1998, faded by 2006 and returned after Telangana.
• Kamtapur: about 17 districts of north Bengal and adjoining Assam. Its claims partly overlap those of Gorkhaland and Greater Cooch Behar.

The North-East

• Bodoland (Northern Assam): the agitation for a Bodo State led to an agreement between the Government of India, the Assam government and the Bodo Liberation Tigers Force.
  • The agreement of 10 February 2003 created the Bodoland Territorial Council, subordinate to Assam, covering four districts and 3,082 Bodo-majority villages.
  • The accord of 27 January 2020 renamed the area the Bodoland Territorial Region and provided for a review of its villages.
• Garoland: the Garo Hills in the western half of Meghalaya, one of that State’s three main tribal areas alongside the Khasi and Jaintia.
• Greater Tipraland: sought by Tipra Motha in Tripura, which joined the State government in 2024 without giving up the demand.
• Kuki-Zo areas of Manipur: the Kuki-Zo Council reaffirmed in December 2025 its demand for a separate administration as a Union Territory. The Home Ministry has told Kuki groups that a separate Union Territory with an Assembly is not feasible.
• Eastern Nagaland: the demand of the Eastern Nagaland Peoples’ Organisation ended in a tripartite agreement on 5 February 2026 for a Frontier Nagaland Territorial Authority.
  • It covers six districts and 46 subjects, and stays within Nagaland and Article 371A.

South India

• Kongu Nadu (Western Tamil Nadu): also called Kongadesam, with Coimbatore as capital, on grounds of demography, culture and language.
  • It takes in western Tamil Nadu, parts of southern Karnataka and central-east Keralam (Kerala).
• Rayalaseema: southern Andhra Pradesh. The Rayalaseema Rashtra Samithi has pressed for a State.
• Tulu Nadu and Kodagu: on the Karnataka coast and hills. Kodagu, the old Coorg, was a Part C State until 1956.

Other Demands and Ladakh

• Maru Pradesh: the desert west of Rajasthan.
• Bagelkhand (Baghelkhand): north-eastern Madhya Pradesh.
• Koshal: western Odisha, where about 42 groups from 10 districts met at Balangir on 10 August 2013.
• Mithilanchal: the Maithili-speaking parts of Bihar and Jharkhand.
• Ladakh: carved out as a Union Territory in 2019 without a legislature, it now seeks statehood and Sixth Schedule safeguards, through the Leh Apex Body and the Kargil Democratic Alliance.
  • Talks stopped after violence in Leh on 24 September 2025, in which four people died, and later resumed.
  • On 16 October 2026 both bodies rejected the Home Ministry’s draft of 15 October, and on 24 October the talks stood deadlocked.
• Jammu and Kashmir: the demand here is for restoration of statehood. In September 2026 it remained a Union Territory.

The Autonomy Route

• The Centre has often answered such demands with autonomy short of statehood:

Need of a Second States Reorganisation Commission

• The test: new States must be competent in economic, administrative and ethnic viability. They should neither impede the nation’s progress nor run against national integration.
• The proposal: on these principles, a new commission could restructure States along constitutional lines without harming regional consciousness or people’s interests.
• Why now: India has passed 79 years of independence, against the 60 years cited in earlier debate. A vibrant economy and new regional disparities are held to call for a fresh look at the Union.
• The caution: carving out smaller States is too complex a matter to settle in the heat of agitation.
  • Where political consensus is lacking and wider effects worry other parts of a State, decisions need wide consultation and a clear roadmap.
• Present position: the Commission of 1953–55 remains the only one of its kind.
  • Parliament’s power: Article 3 requires only an ordinary law, with a State legislature’s views sought but not binding.
  • Centre’s stated view: a Lok Sabha reply of 3 August 2021 said demands arrive “from time to time” and that “presently no such proposal is under consideration”. A similar reply on Vidarbha added that new States are decided on broad consensus.
• Seats and the Census: a new State’s Lok Sabha share depends on delimitation, which Article 82 ties to the first census after 2026.
  • Census 2027 has a reference date of 1 March 2027. A bill to change this link failed in the Lok Sabha in April 2026.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Creating New States

• The record of the States formed in 2000 and 2014 is mixed, so size alone does not decide the outcome.
  • SDG India Index 2023–24: Uttarakhand was joint first at 79, and Jharkhand was near the bottom at 62.
  • Per capita income, 2023–24: Telangana led the large States at ₹3.48 lakh, while Jharkhand stood at ₹1.07 lakh.
• Division also creates new disputes, as with inter-State river waters between Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.