. Integration of Princely States Emergence of Princely States in India A ‘princely state’ or a ‘native state’ is a political unit of a larger administrative province, which either is ruled directly by monarchic lineage or serves as a subsidiary coalition with a more powerful monarchic government. These smaller administrative pockets were based on the political, cultural, lingual, and geographical landscape. In the westerns and central India princely states came into existence with the entry of Rajputs into the Indian sub-continent who migrated from Central Asia around AD(CE).
The word ‘Rajput’ means ‘sons of kings’. Hence, princely states were established even before the Mughal and British colonial invasion. There were a number of Non-Rajput princely states too some ruled by Nawabs and Nijams, some ruled by native dynasties like Mysore, Travancore and Pudukottai. All those monarchical states subordinated to the British India were termed as Princely States.
However, the word ‘princely’ was deliberately retained during the British regime, to ascribe subordination of the rulers in the sub-continent to the British Crown. Attempts at Integrating Princely States As mentioned earlier, the princely states were fragmented administrative pockets and the subject of integration of princely states in the phase preceding Indian independence has a long history even before the Colonial invasion. Many dynasties attempted to integrate the princely states starting from the Maghadan Kings, Bimbisara, and Ajatasatru during Mauryans, Ashoka, Chandragupta and his son Samudragupta, all of them who almost managed to bring many smaller kingdoms together, but consolidating under one rule still remained a far cry. However, when the thirst for power, jealousy and frequent disagreements among kingdoms led to resentment and disunity, it paved way for Arab and Persian invasion, establishing the Moghul empire and eventually conquering the northern part of pre- independent India.
Princely States under British Raj a) Gun Salute System : Therefore, by the time European colonisation, i.e. the British, Portuguese, and French, started to take over, the disunity worked in their favour to establish their presence, initially through trade. Among the three, the British managed to institute sovereignty