D.A Low & why the cow-belt came to dominate Indian politics

 In 'Soundings in Indian History', D.A Low- writing almost 60 years ago of Keir Hardie, the Labour politician's, visit to Indian in 1907- shows that Hindu bhadralok Bengalis and Arya Samaji Punjabis were up in arms against the Government because of the Partition of Bengal on the one hand and the Agrarian Acts in Punjab on the other. UP however was quiet- indeed somnolent. Bombay was divided between Tilak and Gokhale. The South took an intelligent interest in current affairs but had no major grievances. One result of this was that Willingdon, as Governor of Madras, could contemplate Provincial Autonomy with equanimity as early as 1922

Low asks the question why Bengal and Punjab ceased to matter politically. The answer is obvious. They were Muslim majority and partition would marginalize their non-Muslim population. In Maharashtra, Gokhale's Congress, focused on agricultural and other bread and butter issues, would prevail over the dreams of the Hindutva exponents. The Shiv Sena would later emerge as a provincial party focused on issues of relevance to urban Marathas. Maharashtra and Gujarat could do well enough for themselves as could the deep South where the Brahmin dominated Congress soon shat the bed, on the issue of Hindi, and lost influence. 

In this context, Low observes 

So far as nationalist politics was concerned - and there is other evidence in support o f this - U.P. at this time, even though it lay between Bengal and the Panjab, stood politically inert. This, surely, is very remarkable, particularly when one remembers the central role played since about 1920 by men from U.P. both in the Indian nationalist movement and in independent India.

Apart from Gandhi, few men, man for man, have been more important in modern Indian politics than Motilal Nehru, Jawaharlal Nehru, Govind Ballabh Pant, Purushottamdas Tandon, Lai Bahadur Sastri, and Indira Gandhi; and they have all come from U.P. It is not very difficult to see why it should have played this major role. It is, after all, the largest of the states, the least exclusive, and, for internal Indian purposes, the most centrally placed strategically. It stands, moreover, at the centre o f a complex o f other states which have many similar characteristics, and which between them comprise not only the Hindu heartland, but the largest single cluster o f associated states in modern India. Yet if this be
true; if it is really not very difficult to suggest quite a number of reasons why U.P. should have led India in so many ways since about 1920, why was it, so far as nationalist politics were concerned, politically inert in the period preceding?

Low thinks UP was a 'husk' of what it had been. But that is still true 60 years after he wrote this. Being a husk can't explain shit. Thus, Low's answer is itself a question which he couldn't answer but I will. First, I will make the obvious point. The post Mutiny administration in 'Agra and Oudh' (which were consolidated into the United Province in 1921)  and Bihar entrenched itself in a manner quite different from what had happened elsewhere.  The terror of those times survived in living memory. Even those born in the Nineteen Twenties had heard the tales from old family retainers. The Nehru family, which had served the Mughals as kotwals and then John Company as vakils, retained vivid memories of leaving Delhi as homeless refugees. But, as Hindus, they suffered less. It was the Muslim aristocracy which had been dealt the bigger blow. This did mean that middle class Hindus recovered more quickly. Indeed, they began to displace the Muslims because the Brits had arranged things in a manner that the 'taluqdars' were as pasture for their sheep-like accountants and vakils. In other words, the pretence of being a lion was required for 'loyalty' because the reality was that you were grass before the Hindu sheep. True, there were exceptions- e.g. the Nawab of Chattari.

The air of unreality which clung to Muslim politics in UP arose out of the 'common knowledge' that , unlike in Bengal or Punjab, the Hindus were the vast majority. Furthermore, Brahmins are thick on the ground in the area. To a slightly lesser extent, this was also true of Maharashtra.  In the deep South, this was not the case. What this meant was that an educated Hindu 'High Caste' leadership was available in UP which could take a leadership role because it was so strategically located and had no internal enemy to fear or hold it in check. In the short term, this Hindu majority might cozen the Muslims by putting up Persian speaking Kauls like Motilal or Sapru, but sooner or later the pretense would be dropped. 

This obvious point having been made I will now turn to the actual reason UP dominated Indian politics from 1920 to 1980. UP wallahs are as stupid as shit.  Everybody knows it, but nobody says it. The interwar period was a period when every country did stupid shit. India, thanks to Pax Britanica, could go the extra mile and do stupider shit and, obviously, Biharis and UP bhaiyyas are going to outdo others in this respect. As for why UP continued to dominate India for the next 30 years, the answer is that Hindus hadn't fought and won their freedom. The thing had been thrust on them. They needed to stick together and UP wallahs and Biharis aren't utter cowards. They make good soldiers and are decent and pleasant enough. Being as stupid as shit is a desirable property in a soldier more especially since these guys tend to be of good moral character and not too inclined to talk vacuous bollocks at every opportunity. However, stupidity is not a desirable quality when it comes to economic 'mechanism design'. Good moral character may blind you to the need to create 'incentive compatible' mechanisms. Just lecturing everybody to be holier than the holy cow aint going to cut it. Pragmatism and a desire to grow wealthy and secure must drive collective action. 

It must be said that the people of the cow belt never tried to force their stupidity down the throat of anybody else. Indeed, after 1980, they were perfectly content to let smarter people get ahead and hopefully lift them up a little in the process. But UP and Bihar did become prey to the maha-crackpot from South Africa. I may mention that there was something spooky about the way crazy shit kept going down ther3. First you have the Xhosa- Nelson Mandela's people- who are highly intelligent and were prosperous and brave- going utterly crazy and slaughtering all their cattle coz some little girl said this would cause the resurrection of their ancestors who would then drive out the Whites. Quite naturally, most of them starved to death. This happened around the time of the Mutiny. What next happens is that Smuts- one of the bravest and highest I.Q statesmen ever- joins the Boers in an equally doomed war despite the fact that Smuts knew just how powerful and greedy the British Empire really was. Still, Smuts came to his senses and- thanks to a tip-off from Kitchener- prevailed over Milner and quite quickly became a great figure within the British Commonwealth. Gandhi however, though brave, was not smart at all. He did stupid shit in South Africa where, sadly, the Indians (except Gokhale) thought he'd played a blinder. He hadn't. He had prevented the Indians allying with the Coloreds and the rising Working Class. Worse, he and his chums had closed the door to escaping India through indentured labour. 

It is also worth reiterating that Gandhi's first activity in the cow-belt- the Champaran movement- was orchestrated by locals who wanted to distract attention from what was really happening in Bihar- viz. Hindus were beating Muslims till they gave up cow slaughter. On the other hand, this impressed the Khilafati Muslims who wanted to do a mutually advantageous deal. The Hindus gain by supporting an anti-Imperialist platform in Turkey and the MENA which they themselves could help link up to Buddhist struggles in the East. This means the colored people of the world could form a trading and military block and thus capture more of the gains from trade. Cow slaughter wasn't popular with upper class Muslims in the cow belt. It was a lower class demand which threatened their own hegemony. Sure, at some point down the line, the Dalits and Muslims and so on might get a concession on this issue which would be commercially beneficial to everybody but by then the better off would have started to grow rich and would be more interested in portfolio diversification rather than just exploiting the fuck out of the locals. 

Gandhi refused the deal though he said he'd support Khilafat because...urm... some bullshit about God or true manliness or Ahimsa or whatever. But, from the point of view of Indian law, this was a 'benami' transaction because no consideration had passed. This means that when Gandhi unilaterally surrendered in 1922, the Muslims knew they had been left in the lurch. By 1924, Delhi Muslims were saying plainly that they preferred British rule. Many would be forced to migrate when Nehru came to power. 

Gandhi, of course, was a nut-job. Gujaratis, being sensible people, would chase him away if he wagged his tail too much.  It was UP and Bihar which permitted the fabrication of the myth of the Mahatma because, obviously, it is Muth rational for everybody- including UP wallahs- to base their expectations on UP wallahs being as stupid as shit and thus falling for the craziest coot possible. There is a Keynesian Beauty Contest aspect to this. The cowbelt is shitty. Gandhi's basic premise is that Indians are shitty. Thus the shittiest shitheads must rule otherwise India might stop being India. The Indian Freedom Struggle might end in India become Ameri-fucking-kaka! That would totes get your dhoti in a twist.