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The term nation is derived from the Latin word ‘natio’ which means ‘to be born’.

Natio initially had a pejorative meaning because it referred to a community of

outsiders within the boundaries of a city who grouped together when their members increased and could not be integrated by a community, thus becoming known as natio. The word later became nation (Plesu, 2001: 10). In French, it refers to the community of elites of a state. As Maistre has stated, a nation is the sovereign plus the aristocracy (in Plesu, 2001: 10). By the term nation, Durkheim means a group that includes both the state and the nationality (cited in Guibernau, 1996: 28). In the same vein, Weber defines nation as a community of sentiments which would adequately manifest itself in a state of its own; hence, a nation is a community which normally tends to produce a state of its own (cited in Smith, 2001: 25 and see Guibernau, 1996: 33). The essential condition for a group or community of people to be called a nation, according to Durkheim and Weber, is a sovereign state. According to them, a nation is only possible within a state of its own. One can criticise this notion as there are nations which have no states of their own. Such nations have been included, absorbed or annexed by a strong nation-state or state-nation and become nations without a state. Catalonia, Northern Ireland, Balochistan, Tibet, and Kurdish people (Kurdistan) are the best examples.63

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Many nations under multi-national, multi-cultural or multi-ethnic state structures are striving for secession or more autonomy for their respective national or ethnic groups. In the case of Balochistan, the nationalist forces are struggling to gain either more autonomy or complete separation from Pakistan; in Tibet, the Dalai Lama is seeking greater autonomy within China (though the Chinese government accuses him of seeking independence in disguise); the case of Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka (LTTE) was a similar example where the Tamils were once determined for a separate Tamil state. Likewise, we can find a number of cases in India

In contrast to Durkheim’s and Weber’s definition of ‘nation’, Guibernau views ‘nation’ as “a human group conscious of forming a community, sharing a common culture, attached to a clearly demarcated territory, having a common past and a common project for the future and claiming the right to rule itself” (1996: 47). Guibernau sets out five conditions or constituent elements for a group of people to be called a nation. These conditions are: group consciousness (this condition is purely psychological), a common culture, territory, politics, and history. Note however, that this does not mean that every nation possesses or fulfils these conditions. For instance, if we look at the history of Jews prior to the establishment of the state of Israel, they were without territory or political setup, though they retained their status as a nation. There are a plethora of definitions for the term nation, and Uzelac (2002) observes that irrespective of their school of thought, theorists are inclined to define the term by setting certain conditions for its existence, wherein they emphasise on one or several constituent elements. Those like Anderson (1983), Hasting (2005), and others underline that a common language is one of the basic requirements for a nation and for national existence. To Anderson ‘nation’ is “an imagined political community – and imagined as both inherently limited and sovereign” (1983: 6). By an imagined community, he means that members of a nation may never know most of their fellow nationals, but in their minds they have a feeling of being in common in them. Such feelings might be the sense of some common interests amongst members of a nation or it might be specific characteristics such as culture and language. Anderson also argues that “the convergence of capitalism and print technology on the fatal diversity of human language created the possibility of a new form of imagined community, which in its basic morphology set the stage for the modern nations”

such as the Khalistan movement of the Sikhs (though suppressed by the security forces in 1980s) and the on- going struggle of Kashmiris for self-determination.

(1983: 46). And Hasting (2005: 37-38), though he does not provide a working definition of nation itself, argues along the same lines:

Ethnicities naturally turn into nations or integral elements within nations at the point when their specific vernacular moves from an oral to written usage to the extent that it is being regularly employed for the production of a literature....Once an ethnicity’s vernacular becomes a language within an extensive living literature of its own, the Rubicon on the road to nationhood appears to have been crossed. If that fails to pass that point – and most spoken vernaculars do fail that hurdle – then transformation to nationhood is almost certain never to take place.

Additionally, Connor (1994: 75) defines nation as “a group of people characterized by a myth of common descent.” Scholars like Breuilly (2005) and Billig (2005) stress that control over a specific piece of land (territory) is one of the most important constituent element of a nation. There are numerous other examples of scholars who come up with a single constituent element of nation.

Against this, there are many scholars who hold the view that nation cannot be defined through a single element but requires a combination and variety of constituent elements. For instance, Smith defines a nation as “a named human community occupying a homeland, and having common myths and a shared history, a common public culture, a single economy and common legal rights and duties for all members” (Smith, 2001: 13). According to Brass (1991: 20), a nation is “an ethnic community politicized, with recognized group rights in the political system.” On the very first page of its introduction, Seton-Watson (1977: 1) views nation as “a community of people whose members are bound together by a sense of solidarity, a common culture, and a national consciousness.”

The contention is that all of the above definitions of nation, either with single constituent element or with various constituent elements, are concepts of ideal- types (Uzelac, 2002). Although, scholars provide their own direction for analyses

of a specific nation, none of their definitions can be generalized because there are numerous cases where a nation exists without a state of its own or a common language, or a common economy, or common legal rights, or national consciousness (ibid, 2002). In some of the definitions stated above, even a few constituent elements are vague. For instance, Smith uses the terms, ‘single economy’ and ‘common legal rights’. If one applies Smith’s ‘common legal rights’ criterion to the English nation, which is considered to be the first nation or prototype by Hastings (2005) and others, it would not fit the definition because it was only at the beginning of 20th century when women got equal civil rights and duties as those of men. If we look at the ‘single economy’ as a constituent elements (asserted by Smith), then Kashmiri, Baloch, Tibetans, Kurds, and many others would not fit the criterion of a nation because they are part and parcel of their larger states (India, Pakistan, China, and Iraq respectively). Further, according to a conservative estimate, there are 193 sovereign member states of United Nations Organization, 5000 ethnic groups, and all of them together form 6000 language groups (in Topic, 2011). Therefore, if we apply the criterion of a common language as per Anderson (1983) and Hastings (2005) to the above language groups then there would be 6000 nations around the world. Similarly, applying the criterion of common descent and ancestry as proposed by Connor (1994), would lead to 5000 nations around the world. Generally, if we agreed with Durkheim and Weber, there would be 5000 to 6000 sovereign states.

Keeping in view the aforementioned discussion, it can be argued that nation is a social phenomenon, and processes of change (formation and reformation of nations with varying degree of constituent elements) take place around the world constantly. The constituent element or elements of a nation depend upon time and space. Neither a single constituent element nor a combination of elements is

sufficient to define a nation; rather every definition of nation “could be perceived as an operational definition for an analysis of a theorist’s specific research, on a specific case study, at a specific historical period” (Uzelac, 2002, 38).

For my research project, by the term nation I imply a sufficiently large group of people possessing a particular piece of land (or having a claim to particular land) where there exists a sense of oneness and belonging amongst its members who share some commonalities. By commonalities I mean features which knot them together such as a common history, culture, language, religion, heritage, race, ethnicity and or a future course and plan of action. This definition includes almost all the constituent elements of nation as presented by the scholars discussed above. However, this does not mean that every nation possesses all the above- mentioned commonalities or constituent elements; some nations possess all the commonalities while others enjoy one or two or more. In case of the Baloch nation, it is probable that a majority of the nationalists would claim Baloch is a nation by every definition of the word ‘nation’ and would also assert that all the above-stated constituent elements and commonalities exist amongst its members in one form or another.64

So what is the ultimate aim of a nation to be called as a nation? Scholars, who perceive nationalism as a political ideology and doctrine, argue that the ultimate aim of a nation is to achieve a state of its own where they could live according to their set ideals and aspirations or at the very least have a right to self- determination (Anand, 2010).