India, Jan. 15 -- This year, Punjab completes 60 years of the Punjabi Suba. Milestones of this kind are usually marked by celebration or nostalgia. This one calls for something more exacting. Punjabi Suba was not merely a linguistic reorganisation; it was a constitutional promise, a commitment that cultural dignity, political voice, and federal fairness would be secured within the Indian Union. Six decades later, the question that refuses to fade is whether that promise was fully honoured or not.

Punjabi Suba emerged from a deep sense of cultural insecurity in the early decades after Independence. Punjabi language, Sikh cultural identity, and a distinct regional ethos feared marginalisation within a Hindi-majoritarian administrative orde...