77th Independence Day of India: Respect and Gratitude to our Freedom fighters and forefathers.

 

On this day, we celebrate the achievement of Independence from the British rule, I wish each citizen of India offer their sense of gratitude to the freedom fighters and our forefathers for their contribution to shape the modern India, even before the actual independence in 1947.

By the Indian Independence Act 1947, the British gave up their suzerainty of the states and left each of them free to choose whether to join one of the newly independent countries of India and Pakistan or to remain outside them. For a short time, some of the rulers explored the possibility of a federation of the states separate from either, but this came to nothing. Most of the states then decided to accede to India or to Pakistan, such as Junagadh (1947–1948), Bilaspur on 12 October 1948, and Bhopal on 1 May 1949. Travancore also chose to remain an independent country. Hyderabad State was the largest which chose to remain independent. In Operation Polo, in September 1948, it was invaded and annexed by India. In Jammu and Kashmir, a state with a Muslim majority but a Hindu ruler, the Maharaja hoped to remain independent but acceded to India on 27 October 1947 at the outset of the invasion of Jammu and Kashmir by Pakistan — leading to the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947.

We must be grateful the makers of the constitution of India and freedom fighters to have a vision like this despite the fact that, at the time of independence, in 1947, there were nearly 600 (584) princely states who acceded to either India or Pakistan.

I was curious to find out across the how the democracies gave equal rights all citizens to vote which is the most fundamental right of any democratic society. Did bit of search on the internet and found something very interesting on the Wikipedia.  Universal suffrage - Wikipedia

The findings are very startling, twenty of the European countries gave equal rights to all citizens after a lag, after providing the rights to vote for the male citizens. And all these countries also provided the rights to women voters after years of giving rights to the male voters. The biggest gaps are found in the following countries, such as – Spain (165 years), Switzerland (142 years), and so on. This clearly shows, these countries were male dominated as a society and took many years before providing the equal rights to all its citizens (male, female and other minority ethnicities).

Continent	Country or territory	Adult citizens	Male	Female	Male Vs Female	Difference
Europe	Spain	1977	1812	1977	165	165
Europe	Switzerland	1990	1848	1990	142	142
Europe	Greece	1952	1844	1952	108	108
Europe	France	1945	1848	1944	96	97
Europe	Denmark	1915	1849	1915	66	66
Europe	Bulgaria	1945	1879	1945	66	66
Europe	Turkey	1934	1876	1934	58	58
Europe	Serbia	1945	1888	1945	57	57
Europe	Belgium	1948	1893	1948	55	55
Europe	Germany	1919	1871	1919	48	48
Europe	Italy	1945	1912	1945	33	33
Europe	Romania	1948	1918	1948	30	30
Europe	Austria	1918	1896	1918	22	22
Europe	Czech Republic	1918	1896	1918	22	22
Europe	Norway	1913	1898	1913	15	15
Europe	Sweden	1945	1909	1919	10	36
Europe	United Kingdom	1928	1918	1928	10	10
Europe	Ireland	1923	1918	1923	5	5
Europe	Netherlands	1919	1917	1919	2	2
Europe	Estonia	1918	1917	1918	1	1

 

The story is similar in America as well. The USA leading the chart here. It provided equal rights to all its citizens only by 1965 after nearly 109 years of let the white male Americans to vote.

Continent	Country or territory	Adult citizens	Male	Female	Male Vs Female	Difference
North America	United States	1965	1856	1920	64	109
North America	Canada	1960	1920	1920	0	40
North America	Mexico	1953	1917	1953	36	36
North America	Bahamas	1961	1958	1961	3	3

 

The story in South America also similar, Argentina leading the table with 99 years gap between native Argentinian voting to equal rights to all citizens.

Continent	Country or territory	Adult citizens	Male	Female	Male Vs Female	Difference
South America	Argentina	1952	1853	1952	99	99
South America	Brazil	1985	1891	1932	41	94
South America	Colombia	1954	1936	1954	18	18
South America	Bolivia	1952	1938	1952	14	14
South America	Uruguay	1932	1918	1932	14	14

 

The Asian story is here. The biggest gap is from Iran with 57 years to bring parity of equal votes between male and female.

Continent	Country or territory	Adult citizens	Male	Female	Male Vs Female	Difference
Asia	Iran	1963	1906	1963	57	57
Asia	Japan	1945	1925	1945	20	20
Asia	Mauritius	1959	1948	1959	11	11
Asia	Philippines	1946	1935	1937	2	11
Asia	Saudi Arabia	2015	2005	2015	10	10
Asia	China	1953	1947	1953	6	6
Asia	Pakistan	1956	1951	1956	5	5
Asia	Malaysia	1957	1956	1957	1	1
Asia	India	1950	1950	1950	0	0

 

South Africa ended the rule of apartheid only 1994.

Continent	Country or territory	Adult citizens	Male	Female	Male Vs Female	Difference
Africa	South Africa	1994	1910	1931	21	84

 

Australia allowed equal rights to citizens only in 1965.

Continent	Country or territory	Adult citizens	Male	Female	Male Vs Female	Difference
Australia	Australia	1965	1901	1902	1	64
Australia	New Zealand	1893	1879	1893	14	14

 

In view of such disparities in various countries of providing equal rights to all citizens to vote, our fore fathers, who envisioned the independent India and were making the constitution of India, did a great job in providing the equal rights to all citizens (Male, Female, and all ethnicity), which as not the case in many of the progressive democracies of the world.

Value our Independence more now than before after knowing about the world around us!!!