NEW DELHI: On April 1, 1949, when the Jawaharlal Nehru-Vallabhbhai Patel-Pattabhi Sitaramaya (JVP) Committee report was made public it only endorsed what the earlier S K Dar Commission had said in its 56-page report in December, 1948. While arguing in favour of the reorganization of states, which was a prominent demand in south India, Dar had clearly stated that new states should not be formed on linguistic basis.

Congress still learning the ropes of power decided in its Jaipur session of 1948 to re-examine the formation of new states and set up the JVP Committee. The leading trio of the Congress while voicing its opposition to the linguistic basis displayed its classic ambivalence and said, "If public sentiment is insistent and overwhelming, we as democrats, have to submit to it subject to certain limitations in regard to the good of India as a whole." JVP Committee report also said the time is not ripe for creating more states. However, in the same voice it said a case can be made for Andhra Pradesh's Telugu-speaking people. This endorsement was good enough to fan widespread movement and violence among Telugu-speaking people of the Madras state — the highlight being the death of Potti Sriramulu after 56-day hunger strike on December 15, 1952. With situation getting out of hands, Andhra Pradesh was carved out in 1953.

Creation of AP virtually opened the floodgates of aspiration. Bowing to the nationwide pressure Nehru in December 1953 announced the formation of State Reorganisation Commission under Fazl Ali and Sardar K M Pannikkar and Hari Nath Kunzru as members. SRC was to look into the demand for separate states while factoring in history and other factors. Its report two years later in September, 1955, recommended the abolition of A, B, C, D category of states as originally enshrined in the Constitution. Instead, SRC said there should be 16 states and three Union Territories (UTs). SRC had recommended formation of Hyderabad as a separate state spread over 45,300 square miles. Bulk of its recommendations was accepted leading to the passage of State Reorganisation Act , 1956, and creation of 14 states and five UTs.

But the creation of new states was far from over. In May, 1956, the French government passed Chandernagore, Mahe, Yanam and Karaikal to India. Puducherry was turned into a UT. In 1961, Goa was liberated from the Portuguese. During all this, tension was simmering between Marathi and Gujarati-speaking people of Bombay. Thus was born Gujarat and Maharashtra in 1960. Virtual competition for new states had begun. Government capitulated to Akali leader Master Tara Singh's demand for separate homeland for Sikhs in Punjab. On lines of bifurcation of Bombay, Punjab and Haryana was created. Status of Chandigarh – if it would be the joint capital — was not settled initially, but later the two states came to terms with sharing the city designed by Le Corbusier.

North-east was facing similar sentiments. Bowing to the demand of the Nagas, Nagaland was carved out of Assam in 1963. Assam was to face another surgery in 1966 with the formation of Meghalaya. 1971 saw a spate of new states: Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Tripura (the two were UTs earlier). Also UTs of Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh were created. Sikkim was made associate state in 1974 and full state in 1975.

Through all this movement for a separate Jharkhand — consisting of tribal areas of Bihar, Bengal and Odisha — was brewing and so was a demand for separation of hill regions from UP. Tribal-dominated areas of MP also wanted a separate identity. A big votary of smaller states, BJP acceded to the demand and thus was born Jharkhand, Uttarakhand and Chhattisgarh on November 1, 2000. But Telangana demand was not met. It took another 13 years for the new state to come up. This definitely is not the last new state to be formed.