Punjab The decade of 1980s also witnessed major developments in the State of Punjab. The social composition of the State changed first with Partition and later on after the carving out of Haryana and Himachal Pradesh. While the rest of the country was reorganised on linguistic lines in 1950s, Punjab had to wait till for the creation of a Punjabi speaking State. The Akali Dal, which was formed in as the political wing of the Sikhs, had led the movement for the formation of a ‘Punjabi suba’.
The Sikhs were now a majority in the truncated State of Punjab. Political context After the reorganisation, the Akalis came to power in and then in . On both the occasions it was a coalition government. The Akalis discovered that despite the redrawing of the boundaries, their political position remained precarious.
Firstly, their government was dismissed by the Centre mid-way through its term. Secondly, they did not enjoy strong support among the Hindus. Thirdly, the Sikh community, like all other religious communities, was internally differentiated on caste and class lines. The Congress got more support among the Dalits, whether Hindu or Sikh, than the Akalis.
Master Tara Singh ( – ): Prominent Sikh religious and political leader; one of the early leaders of the Shiromani Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee (SGPC); leader of the Akali movement; supporter of the freedom movement but opposed to Congress’ policy of negotiating only with the Muslims; after Independence, he was the senior most advocate of formation of separate Punjab State. This is all about governments, officials, leaders, terrorists… but what about the people in Jammu and Kashmir? In a democracy we must go by what they want, shouldn’t we?