At a time when the Indian Constitution is under sustained strain, this incisive monograph turns to one of its most foundational ideas: federalism. Although the word itself finds no place in the text of the Constitution, it has shaped the Republic’s attempt to reconcile unity with an extraordinary diversity of language, region, culture and political aspiration.
Drawing on the Constituent Assembly debates—shaped by earlier constitutional arrangements as well as the upheaval of Partition—Avinash Kumar traces how India’s distinctive federal arrangement, a ‘Union of States’ with a marked tilt to the Centre, came into being, and follows its evolution through the subsequent history of the Republic. He shows how this structure has been continually tested: through linguistic reorganization, the use and misuse of Article 356, the deepening of decentralization through the 73rd and 74th Amendments, and the persistent contestations between Central authority and State autonomy, nowhere sharper than in fiscal federalism.
The book argues that the post-2014 phase of aggressive centralization, driven by Hindutva ideology, is a challenge to the plural and negotiated character of the Indian Union, and raises urgent questions about the future of federal democracy in India.
Historical in scope and contemporary in its concerns, this monograph invites readers to rethink federalism not as a technical arrangement, but as a living constitutional principle—one that remains essential to sustaining India’s democratic and inclusive order.