Today Uttarakhand is widely known as the Land of the Gods. However there exists a rather not so godly story behind its formation. Let’s delve into that today.
The formation of this 27th state of India was a result of the struggle that the natives of this region went through, after experiencing states of neglection and the consequential deprivation. Before independence there were many associations which were created to uphold the rights of the people belonging to the hilly regions. Though, the demand for a separate state for the region came in the year 1952, in the year 1938, during a conference held in Srinagar, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru along with Vijay Laxmi Pandit did shared a vision of making Uttaranchal a separate state after independence. Unfortunately the vision remained a vision and the region became a part of an ethnically different state of Uttar Pradesh. This led to lots of issues for the people belonging to the remote hilly regions as more often than not, were they neglected and sidelined as the matters of the plains became more prominent and significant in the eyes of the Uttar Pradesh administration.
This was the beginning for a voice of change and soon people began demanding a separate administrative block in the hilly regions too, this demand evolved for a separate state within a few years. In the year 1952, P.C. Joshi became the first person to voice this issue. Fazal Ali redistribution commission also recommended the formation of a new state for the betterment of the people and economy. Decades passed but the consistent denial of the state government became a norm and riots followed the course of action. Persistent riots and the follow up by police intervention became a rightful norm and such incidents broke out quite a few times. The struggle took an ugly turn when on 2nd September 1994, during one of the major disputes, seven civilians got killed by police firing. However the tables turned when in the year 1996, the then Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda announced the soon to be formation of a new state of Uttaranchal from the Red Fort of Delhi. It was initially thought that Uttaranchal was formed to cater to the long neglected people of the hilly regions. However, the ethnic diversity was cited as the significant reason for the decision. The state was renamed as Uttarakhand in the year 2007 after the Union Cabinet brought in a bill for the cause on the grounds of it being the ancient and original term for the region.
Nineteen years have passed and much has changed but the issues of economic backwardness and development persists and the hilly regions still lack the needed attention. However things are looking better and change is visible especially after the Uttarakhand Investors Summit of 2018 which raked in a mammoth amount of Rupees 74,000 crores to be invested for a high speed growth addressing projects ranging from film cities to tourism and industry in one go.
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