to Sikh theology itself, as the Khalsa had been established in 1699 to organize religious Sikhs into a political community, one of Guru Gobind Singh's signature contributions to Sikhism, the party received strong support from its base by offering this political organization rooted in religious tradition. Though it was commonly recognized at the time of Independence that the Indian states were created not on a rational basis, but were the result of the exigencies of the progressive British conquest of the subcontinent, and Congress had been advocating the reorganization of provinces for over a quarter century prior, a commission that had been set up in 1948 by the Government of India, tasked with drawing up clean-cut states corresponding to demographic and linguistic boundaries, was not effective in the northern part of the country, as it reconsidered its position on the north. While states across the country were extensively redrawn on linguistic lines at the behest of linguistic groups, the only languages not considered for statehood were Punjabi, Sindhi and Urdu. Its jurisdiction was limited to the southern states, with northern India kept out of its purview, specifically to avoid problems like those of Punjab, in particular issues raised by the Sikhs. In its 10 December 1948 report, the Commission recommended that "the formation of provinces on exclusively or even mainly linguistic considerations is not in the larger interests of the Indian nation." It recommended the reorganisation of the provinces of Madras, Bombay and Central Provinces and Berar primarily on the basis of geographical contiguity, financial self-sufficiency and ease of administration. Soon after the report was published, the Congress, at its Jaipur session, set up the "JVP committee" to study the recommendations of the Dhar Commission. The committee consisted of Jawaharlal Nehru and Vallabhbhai Patel, in addition to the Congress president Pattabhi Sitaramayya. In its report dated 1 April 1949, the Committee stated that the time was not suitable for formation of new provinces, but also stated that the "public sentiment is insistent and overwhelming, we, as democrats, have to submit to it, but subject to certain limitations in regard to the good of India as a whole. The Sikhs now constituted a majority in the northwestern seven districts of the thirteen districts of East Punjab state at the time: Gurdaspur, Amritsar, Hoshiarpur, Jalandhar, Firozpur, Ludhiana, and Ambala, along with Patiala and East Punjab States Union, or PEPSU, which had been