ISSN No. 2454 – 1427 CDE November 2016 CREATING LONG PANELS USING CENSUS DATA: 1961-2001 Hemanshu Kumar Email: [email protected] Department of Economics Delhi School of Economics Rohini Somanathan Email: [email protected] Department of Economics Delhi School of Economics Working Paper No. 248 http://www.cdedse.org/pdf/work248.pdf CENTRE FOR DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS DELHI SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS DELHI 110007 Creating Long Panels using Census Data: 1961-2001 Hemanshu Kumar Rohini Somanathan∗ November 2016 Abstract Indian data are mostly published at the state or district level. Multi-year anal- yses of these data are made difficult by the many changes in state and district boundaries that have occurred since the first comprehensive census of independent India in 1961. Between 1961 and 2001, the number of states and union territories in India increased from 26 to 35, and the number of districts increased from 339 to 593. There were several changes in both names and boundaries. We document these changes and use them to construct regions of amalgamated districts with constant boundaries. There are 232 such regions for the entire period 1961-2001. These can be used to construct panel data sets that cover this forty-year period. ∗Contact information: Both authors are at the Delhi School of Economics ([email protected], [email protected]). We are very grateful to Kritika Goel and Mahima Vasishth for research assis- tance. 1 1 Introduction Official data in India are mostly published at two levels: the state, and below it, the district. Multi-year analyses of these data are made difficult by the many changes in state and district boundaries that have occurred since the first comprehensive census of independent India in 1961. Between 1961 and 2001, the number of states and union ter- ritories in India increased from 26 to 35, and the number of districts increased from 339 to 593. There were changes in both names and boundaries. We document these changes and use them to construct regions of amalgamated districts with constant boundaries. There are 232 such regions for the entire period 1961-2001. These can form the basis of multi-year panels of Indian district data. The Indian federal structure consists of states, which have elected governments, and centrally administered union territories. Early changes in state boundaries after Inde- pendence aimed at creating coherent linguistic and cultural units within a federal struc- ture. More recent changes have resulted from a combination of identity-based mass movements within existing states and political responses to them at strategic stages during electoral cycles. District changes occurred initially to absorb the many princely states and later as a means to expand government as populations grew. Many excel- lent accounts of these changes are available (Tillin, 2013; Chandra, 2007). We restrict ourselves here to their practical implications for users of Indian data. In previous work published in Kumar and Somanathan (2009), we documented district- level boundary changes between 1971 and 2001. Here we build upon this work in three ways: we extend the ambit of analysis back by another decade. Second, we include changes in state names and boundaries since many of these took place during 1961-71. Finally, we create collections of amalgamated districts which can be used for panel data analysis over the forty year period and display these on a map. As before, we use information from the volumes on the General Population Tables (Part II-A), published in the Census of India rounds from 1961 through 2001. In particular, Appendix 1 to Table A-1 and the Appendix to Table A-2 in the General Population Tables contain information on the area and population of each state and district as per its current boundaries, as well as the population in the previous census adjusted to current boundaries. The footnotes to the Appendix to Table A-2 specify the individual transfers between affected states and districts, along with details of the government notification that effected the transfer. The next section details changes in state names and boundaries. The following section focuses on the districts, which we divide into three sets: those with unchanged bound- aries, clean partitions of existing districts, and all the rest. We end with a map of the 232 regions that can be used to create panels of data that have been published at the district level. 2 The States At the end of colonial rue in 1947, India inherited a map of administrative divisions that had been \shaped by the military, political or administrative exigencies or conveniences 2 of the moment... with small regard to the natural affinities or wishes of the people." (Government of India, 1918, p. 28, para 39) When the Constitution was adopted in 1950, the roughly 560 former princely states had been integrated with the rest of the country and all states were arranged in one of four categories, A through D with varying degrees of autonomy from the federal government.1 The States Reorganization Act of 1956 altered state boundaries for greater linguistic coherence and created the state map that was in place at the time of the 1961 census. The four-fold division of states was replaced by a two-fold classification of states and union territories. Three types of changes affected state boundaries after 1961. First, new states were created from the partitioning of existing states. This occurred mainly in the first and last of the four decades we consider. Second, some union territories received state status and some states changed names. Finally, there were small territorial transfers across existing states. Several states and union territories witnessed no such changes between 1961 and 2001: Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Andhra Pradesh, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Gujarat, Jammu and Kashmir, Kerala, Maharashtra, Orissa, Pondicherry, Rajasthan, and West Bengal. We discuss the rest below and summarize the changes in Table 1. 2.1 New states In the sixties and early seventies, new states were created in north and north-east India. This was part of the move to reorganize states into a new federal structure after Independence. The Punjab Reorganization Act, 1966 led to the creation of the state of Haryana and a union territory of Chandigarh. A part of Punjab was also merged with the union territory of Himachal Pradesh to form the state of Himachal Pradesh.2 Meghalaya was created from portions of Assam in 1969.3 The North-Eastern Areas (Reorganization) Act of 1971 modified the boundaries of Meghalaya and also created the union territory of Mizoram on 21 January 1972 out of the Mizo hills area of Assam.4 In our tables, we follow the census convention of treating Mizoram as a separate entity only from the Census of 1981, while Meghalaya is treated as a state starting with the Census of 1971. In the eighties, the union territory of Goa, Daman and Diu in western India was parti- tioned into the state of Goa and the union territory of Daman and Diu.5 There were major changes in 2000, when three new states were created. Chhattisgarh was carved out of Madhya Pradesh in November 2000,6 the hill districts of Uttar Pradesh became Uttaranchal,7 and southern Bihar became Jharkhand.8 2.2 Changes in nomenclature and status Once the southern states had been reorganised along linguistic lines, their names were changed to reflect their linguistic identity. The state of Madras was renamed Tamil Nadu in 1968 and Mysore was renamed Karnataka in 1973.9 3 The union territory of Laccadive, Minicoy and Amindivi Islands was changed to Lak- shadweep, also in 1973.10 At the time of the Census of 1961, the North East Frontier Agency was administered directly by the President of India through the Governor of Assam. The North-Eastern Areas (Reorganization) Act, 1971 this region became the union territory of Arunachal Pradesh in 1972. It is listed as such in the Census 1971 volumes. Arunachal Pradesh as well as Mizoram acquired statehood in February 1987.11 Several other changes of status also occurred in the 1960s and early 1970s in the north- eastern parts of the country. The former princely states of Manipur and Tripura had become union territories under the States Reorganisation Act of 1956, and acquired full statehood in January 1972.12 They are treated as states starting from the census of 1971. Nagaland became a state in December 1963.13 It was treated as a union territory in the census of 1961, and as a state from 1971 onwards. Sikkim became a full state of the Indian union according to the Constitution (Thirty- sixth Amendment) Act, 1975. Its census however was being conducted by India in previous waves as well. It is counted as a union territory in the census of 1961, and as a state thereafter. (Government of India, 1975, pp. 40{41) The union territory of Delhi was renamed as the National Capital Territory of Delhi by the Constitution (Sixty-ninth Amendment) Act, 1991. Unlike other union territories however, it has a legislative assembly and therefore an intermediate status. It continues to be listed as a union territory in Census documents. 2.3 Small inter-state territorial transfers There are a few instances of minor alterations to state boundaries, usually made to correct for geographical anomalies. In two cases, boundaries that earlier fluctuated with changes in the course of rivers, were sought to be made permanent. The Bihar and Uttar Pradesh (Alteration of Boundaries) Act 1968 fixed boundaries affected by changes in the flow of the Ganga and Ghagra rivers.14 Similarly, the Haryana and Uttar Pradesh (Alteration of Boundaries) Act 1979 fixed state boundaries affected by changes in the course of the river Yamuna.15 Both these boundary adjustments affected tiny fractions of the state populations.