# White Paper on Indian States (1950)/Part 2/General Survey

General Survey
23. Sub-section (1) of Section 811 of the Government of India Act, 1935, as originally enacted, defined 'Indian State' as including "any territory, whether described as a State, an Estate, a Jagir or otherwise, belonging to or under the suzerainty of a Ruler who is under the suzerainty of His Majesty and not being a part of British India". In political practice the term applied to a political community occupying a territory in India of defined boundaries and subject to a common Ruler who enjoyed or exercised, as belonging to him, any of the functions and attributes of internal sovereignty duly recognised by the Paramount Power.
24. The Butler Committee and the Simon Commission applied this elastic term to 562 units, whereas the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Indian Constitutional Reforms referred to 600 units as States. The term covered, at one end of the scale, units like Hyderabad and Kashmir which were of the size of the United Kingdom, and at the other end minute holdings in Kathiawar extending only to a few acres.
25. Out of the total area enclosed within the territories of pre-Partition India, i.e., 1,581,410 square miles, the Indian States covered an area of 715,964 square miles, which constituted about 45 per cent. of the total Indian territories. In post-Partition India, the area covered by the States geographically contiguous to India was reduced to 587,949 square miles, being about 48 per cent. of the total area of the Dominion of India, viz.. 1,221,072 square miles. The State of Jammu and Kashmir with a territory of 84,471 square miles and the Hyderabad State closely following it with a territory of 82,313 square miles constituted the largest territorial units amongst the States. There were 15 States which had territories of more than 10,000 square miles and 67 having territories ranging from 1,000 to 10,000 square miles. There were 202 States each having an area of less than 10 square miles.
28. The total population of the States according to the census figures of 1941 was 93.2 millions, constituting about 24 per cent. of the total population of pre-Partition India, namely, 389 millions; after Partition the total population of the Dominion of India was reduced to 318.9 millions ​and of the States within the geographical orbit of the Indian Dominion to 89 millions changing the relative population ratio of the States from 24 per cent. to 28 per cent.
27. In pre-Partition India 16 States had a population of over one million. These 16 States plus 4 others with a population of more than 750,000 but less than a million were assigned individual representation in the Constituent Assembly of India. These 20 States claimed 60 seats in the Constituent Assembly as against 33 seats assigned to the rest of the States; of these 20 States, 11 were entitled to send two or more representatives. Of the rest 13 had a population between 500,000 and 750,000. The remainder of the 140 States which were members of the Chamber of Princes in their own right, had a population ranging from 25,000 to 500,000.
28. The distribution of the principal communities over the territories of the States in post-Partition India showed that 27 per cent. and 26 per cent. respectively of the total population of Hindus (including Scheduled Castes) and Muslims were to be found in the States. In the case of the Sikhs and Indian Christians, however, the percentage was much higher; the States claimed 50 per cent. of the Indian Christians and 36 per cent. of the Sikhs residing in the Domnion of India. The corresponding figures for pre-Partition India were: Hindus 25 per cent., Muslims 16 per cent., Indian Christians 46 per cent. and Sikhs 27 per cent.
29. The revenues of the States, which in numerous cases did not reflect their relative areas and population, showed equal disparity. Nineteen States had a revenue of rupees ten millions or more a year; seven had revenue ranging between five to ten millions and the figure descended gradually till in the case of petty principalities it showed a revenue approximating to an artisan's average wages.