Central Provinces and Berar
Central Provinces and Berar | |||||||||||
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Province of British India | |||||||||||
1903–1950 | |||||||||||
Central Provinces and Berar in 1909, showing the districts, divisions, and princely states under the authority of the province, as well as the 1905 changes to the eastern boundary | |||||||||||
Capital | Nagpur | ||||||||||
Population | |||||||||||
• 1941 | 16,813,584 | ||||||||||
History | |||||||||||
• Merger of the Central Provinces and Berar Province | 1903 | ||||||||||
• Creation of Madhya Bharat State | 1950 | ||||||||||
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The Central Provinces and Berar was a
The Central Provinces was formed in 1861 by the merger of the Saugor and Nerbudda Territories and Nagpur Province. Administration of the Berar region of the Hyderabad princely state was assigned to the Chief Commissioner of the Central Provinces in 1903, and for administrative purposes, Berar was merged with the Central Provinces to form the Central Provinces and Berar on 24 October 1936.[2] After Indian Independence in 1947, a number of princely states were merged into the Central Provinces and Berar, which, when the Constitution of India went into effect in 1950, became the new Indian state of Madhya Bharat, merged with Madhya Pradesh in 1956, also meaning Central Province.
As its name suggests, the province was situated in the center of the Indian peninsula. It comprised large portions of the broad belt of hill and plateau which interposes between the plains of the Ganges and the Deccan Plateau. The Central Provinces and Berar were bounded on the north and northeast by the
History
British India
The Central Provinces comprised 19th-century British conquests from the Mughals and Marathas in central India, and covered much of present-day Chhattisgarh with portions of Madhya Pradesh, and Maharashtra states. Its capital was Nagpur.[3]
After the defeat of the
In 1818, the Maratha
The Saugor and Nerbudda Territories were joined with the Nagpur province to constitute the new Central Provinces in 1861. on 1 October 1903 Berar was placed under the administration of the commissioner of the Central Provinces. In October 1905, most of
In 1903, the Marathi-speaking
The Government of India Act 1912 permitted the creation of legislative councils for provinces under a chief commissioner, and on 8 November 1913, the Central Provinces Legislative Council was formed.[6] The Government of India Act 1919 changed the administrator of the province from a chief commissioner to a governor, and enlarged the legislative council and expanded the voting franchise.
The first elections for the Legislative Council under the 1919
The Montagu-Chelmsford reforms also introduced the principle of
By 1923, the nationalists had decided to participate in the legislative elections, and in the November and December 1923 election, and the Swaraj Party, which advocated Indian independence, won 41 of the 54 elected seats. 4 seats went to independents who generally allied with the Swarajists, four to the Liberals, and five to independents allied with the Liberals. The Swarajists were led by B. S. Moonje from Vidarbha, E. Raghavendra Rao from Mahakoshal, and S. B. Tambe and B. G. Khaparde of Berar. S. M. Chitnavis was leader of the Liberals. Despite winning a majority of seats, the Swarajists, consistent with the party's policy of obstruction and non-acceptance of office, refused to form a government, and Governor Frank Sly selected Chitnavis and Syed Hifazat Ali, a Muslim independent, as ministers.[7]
In the 1926 election, the Swarajists split, with one faction continuing with the policies of obstruction and non-acceptance of office, while the Responsive Cooperation Party which chose to participate in government. After the election B. S. Moonje formed a ministry by uniting Responsive Cooperation, Independent Congress, Liberal, and independent legislators into a National Party, with 33 members.[7]
The ministry collapsed in 1933 due to infighting among the ministers and a new ministry was formed under Raghavendra Rao with Muhammad Yusuf Shareef and V. B. Choubal as ministers. This ministry collapsed in 1934 and a new ministry was formed with B. G. Khaparde as Chief Minister and K. S. Naidu as the other minister. This ministry remained in office till 1937.[7]
In 1933, the princely states in Chhattisgarh Division were transferred to the Eastern States Agency, and Makrai to the Central India Agency. On 24 October 1936, the Central Provinces became the Central Provinces and Berar when it was fully merged with Berar Division, although it remained under the nominal sovereignty of Hyderabad.[8]
In 1935, the Government of India Act was passed by the British Parliament. This act provided for the election of a provincial assembly, with an electorate made up of men with a minimum of financial resources, and excluding women and the poor. Supervisory powers over the enclaved and attached Princely States were reserved to the Governor and removed from the authority of the popular provincial governments. Elections were held in 1937, and the Indian National Congress took a majority of the seats but declined to form the government. A minority provisional government was formed under E. Raghavendra Rao.[9]
Minister | Portfolio |
---|---|
E. Raghavendra Rao | Gaol, Police, Political, Military, Judicial, and Legal |
Balkrishna Ganesh Khaparde | Revenue, Land Records, Survey, Settlement, Forest, Excise, Stamp, and Education |
Syed Wakil Ahmed Rizvi | Finance, Local Self-Government, Medical, Public Health, and Public Works |
Dharamrao Bhujangrao | Agriculture, Commerce, Industry, and Registration |
The Congress reversed its decision and resolved to accept office in July 1937. Therefore, the Governor invited
Minister | Portfolio |
---|---|
N. B. Khare
|
Premier, Home |
Yusuf Shareef | Law and Justice |
P. B. Gole | Revenue |
Ramrao Deshmukh | Public Works |
Ravi Shankar Shukla
|
Education |
Dwarka Prasad Mishra | Local Self-government |
D. K. Mehta | Finance |
Khare resigned in 1938, and
After Indian independence
India became independent on 15 August and the Central Provinces & Berar became a province of the Dominion of India. The princely states, which were under the Central Provinces before 1936, were merged into the province, and organized into new districts. When the Constitution of India went into effect in 1950, the Central Provinces & Berar was reorganized with territorial changes as the state of Madhya Pradesh, which name also means Central Province.
On 1 November 1956, Madhya Bharat, together with the states of
Demographics
The 1911 census counted a population of 16,033,310 for the Central Provinces and Berar. Droughts in 1917 and 1920 caused famine in several districts, and the Central Provinces were affected by bubonic plague in 1911, 1912, 1915, 1917, and 1918, and by the
The 1931 census found a total population of 17,990,937 for the Central Provinces and Berar - 12,065,885 for the British districts, 3,441,838 for Berar, and 2,483,214 in the princely states.[15]
Administration
The 1941 Census of India counted 16,813,584 persons in the province, of which 2,093,767 were urban and 14,719,817 were rural.[16]
Districts
The Central provinces and Berar was made up of 22 districts, grouped into five divisions :
- Mandladistricts.
- Nerbudda (Narmada) Division (18,382 sq. mi.), which included Narsinghpur, Hoshangabad, Nimar, Betul, and Chhindwara districts.
- Balaghatdistricts.
- Durg(created 1905) districts.
- Wundistricts.
Princely States
The Central provinces and Berar included also 15
Salute states, in order of precendence :
- Kalahandi (Karond), title Maharaja, Hereditary salute of 9-guns
- Patna, title Maharaja, Hereditary salute of 9-guns
- Sonepur, title Maharaja, Hereditary salute of 9-guns
Non-salute states, alphabetically :
- Bamra, title Raja
- Bastar, title (Maha) Raja
- Chhuikandan (Kondka), title Mahant
- Kanker, title Raja
- Kawardha, title Thakur
- Khairagarh, title Raja
- Makrai, title Raja (from 1899, Raja Hathiya Rai)
- (Raj) Nandgaon, title Mahant
- Raigarh, title Raja Bahadur
- Rairakhol State, title Raja
- Sakti, title Rana
- Sarangarh, title Raja
See also
References
- ^ "Gazetteers of the Bombay Presidency-Buldhana district-History-British Period". Buldhana District Gazetteer website. Archived from the original on 6 October 2008. Retrieved 25 March 2009.
- ^ "Provinces". Retrieved 28 September 2014.
- Imperial Gazetteer of India, 1908-1931; Clarendon Press, Oxford
- ^ a b Chisholm 1911, p. 683.
- ^ Imperial Gazetteer of India, (New ed.), Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1908-1909. Vol. 10, Page 1.
- ^ "The Gazetteers Department - AMRAVATI". Archived from the original on 8 October 2010. Retrieved 4 February 2010.
- ^ ISBN 81-85119-58-9.
- ^ a b Olson, James S. and Robert Shadle, eds. Historical Dictionary of the British Empire, Vol. 1. Greenwood Publishing Group, UK 1996. P. 227.
- ^ "Provincial Governments (Ministers)". Parliament.uk. Retrieved 7 September 2019.
- ISBN 978-0-333-19369-3.
- ISBN 9788173200038.
- ISBN 978-0-19-561135-9.
- ^ Markovits, Claude (ed.) (2004). A History of Modern India: 1480–1950. Anthem Press, London
- ^ 1921 Census of India. Accessed 16 November 2013 Archived 8 February 2013 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ 1931 Census of India. Accessed 12 November 2013 Archived 12 November 2013 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Census of India 1941, accessed 12 November 2013
- public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Central Provinces and Berar". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 5 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 681–683. This contains a more-detailed account of the geography and history of the provinces up to the 19th century. This article incorporates text from a publication now in the