ABSTRACT
On August 15, 1947, Nehru, referring to himself as the ‘First Servant of the Indian People’ (invoking in his rhetoric the Soviet People’s Commissars of the early days of the Russian Revolution), outlined the many problems that faced the new state. The predominant problems, he reiterated, were economic: the country was faced with inflation, the people with lack of food and clothing and adequate shelter. ‘Production today is the first priority,’ he explained; but on its own it would not be enough – the key social question would be one of distribution.1 But these priorities would have to be deferred. For Nehru, the early years after independence, from 1947 to 1950, were ones of struggle, as he sought to maintain his political authority within his own party, and his government tried to maintain the stability and effective independence of the new state.
The problem of stabilisation was in the first instance one of ending the disorder and violence associated with partition. Vallabhbhai Patel, the central negotiator with the Indian States, and deputy prime minister and Home minister in Nehru’s first government, formed with Nehru the second part of what came to be called the ‘duumvirate’. As Home minister, Patel was in charge of suppression of rioting and revenge killings, and dealing with problems of the influx of refugees from West and East Pakistan.
