Federalism
What is federalism
- USSR was one of the world's superpower, but after 9089 it simply broke up into several independent countries.
- One of the major reason for its breakup was the excessive centralisation and concentration of power ,and the domination of Russia over other reasons with independent language and culture of their on example: Uzbekistan.
- Is not it a great achievement that India which emerged as an independent Nation state in 1947 after A painful partition.
- India is a land of continent proportion and immense diversities .
- There are more than 20 major language and several hundred ones.
- It is the home of several major religions .
- There are several million indigenous peoples living in different part of the country
- In spite of all these diversities we share a common land mass .
- federalism does not consist of a set fixed principles, which are applied to different historical situations .
- American freedom lies one of the first major attempt to build a federal polity is different from German or Indian federalism.
There are also few key ideas and concept associated with federalism .
1 . Essentially ,federalism is an institutional mechanism to accommodate two set of politics one at the regional level and the other at the national level.
- Each government is autonomous in its own sphere .
- In some Federal Countries, there is even a system of dual citizenship ,India has only one single citizenship .
3 . The detail of this dual system of government are generally spelt out in a written constitution , which is considered to be Supreme and which is also the source of power of both set of government.
4 . To prevent conflict between the centre and the state there is an independent Judiciary settle dispute.
- The Judiciary has the power to resolve disputes between the central government and the states on legal matter about the division of power.
- Real politics culture ideology and history determine the actual working of a federation.
- A culture of trust Corporation, mutual respect and restraint helps Federation to function is smoothly.
- political parties also determine the way a constitution would work.
Federalism in the Indian Constitution
- There was awareness that Indian society had regional diversity and linguistic diversity.
- In view of the agitation of the Muslim Leagu for Greater representation to the Muslims , a promise formula to give very large power to the Regional was discussed during the negotiation before partition.
- The most important feature of the federal system adopted by the Indian Constitution is the principle that relation between the states and the centre would be based on cooperation.
Division of power
- There are two set of government created by the Indian Constitution: one for the entrie and nation called the union government and one for each unit or state called the state government .
- Both of these have a constitutional status and clearly in defined area of activity .
- The constitution clearly demarcated subjects, which are under the exclusive domain of the Union and those under the states.
Federalism with a strong Central Government
- It is Generally Accepted that the India constitution has created a strong Central Government .
- India is a country of Continental dimensions with immense diversities and social problem.
- The farmer of the Constitution believe that we required a federal Constitution that would accommodate diversities.
- Poverty illiteracy and inequality of wealth for some of the problem that required planning and coordination.
- The concern for unity and development prompted the marker of the constitution to create a strong central government.
- The important provisions that create a strong central government.
- The parliament is empowered to 'form a new state by separation of territory from any state or by Unity two or more States .
- During an emergency, power become lawfully centralised .
- In the first place,items generating revenue or under the control of the central government.
- Secondly ,India adopt planning as the instrument of rapid economic progress and development after independence.
- Planning lead to considerable centralisation of economic decision making.
- The union government use its discretion to give grant and loan to states.
5 . The constitution clearly states that executive power of the centre are superior to the executive power of the states.
6 . The all Indian services are common to the entrieterritory of India and officers chosen of these service serve in the administration of the states.
- An IAS officer who become the collector or and IPS officer who serve as the Commissioner of Police, are under the control of the central government .
- Article 33 and 34 authorised the Parliament to protect person in the service of the union or a state in respect of any action taken them law to maintain or restore order.
- The Armed Forces Special power act has been made on the basis of these provision .
Conflict in India's federal system
- The constitution recognise the separate identity of the regions and yet gives more powers to the centre.
- Once the principle of Identity of the state is accepted, it is quite a natural that the state would expect a greater role and power in the Governance of the state and the country as a whole.
- The legal disputes between the centre and the state can be resolved by the Judiciary demand for autonomy are of political nature and need to be resolved through negotiations.
Centre state relations
- The constitution is only of Fame work or a skeleton, its flesh and blood is provided by the actual process of politics.
- In the 1950 and early 1960 as the foundation of our federalism was laid under Jawaharlal Nehru.
- It was also a period of Congress dominance over the country as well as the states .
- The states were hopeful that they would be making for progress with the help of grants in aid from the centre.
- In the middle of the 1960 Congress dominance declined somewhat and in a large number of state opposition parties came to power.
- In fact, these demand was a direct fallout of the fact that different parties were ruling at the centre and in many states.
- The Congress too, was not very comfortable with the idea of dealing with government led by opposition parties .
- Finally, since the 1990s Congress dominance has largely ended and we have entered an era of coalition politics especially at the centre.
- In the state too, different parties both National and regional,have come to power
- This has resulted in a greater say for the states are respect for diversity and the beginning of a more mature federalism.
Demands of autonomy.
- Autonomy refers to different things for different states and parties.
- These demands expect that the division of power should be changed in favour of the states and more power and important power be assigned to the state.
- Many states and many parties have made demand of autonomy from the time to time
- Another demand is that States should have independent source of revenue and greater control over the resources. this is also known as financial autonomy
- In 1977 the left front government in West Bengal brought out a document demanding a restructuring of centre state relation in India.
- In the autonomy demand of Tamilnadu and Punjab also there was an implicit support to the idea of Greater financial power
- The third aspect of the autonomy demand relates to the administrative power of the state.
- State recent the control of the over the administrative machinery .
- Fourthly, autonomy demand may also relate to cultural and legislative issues.
- The opposition to the dominance of Hindi or demand of advancing the Punjabi language and culture are instance of this.
- some state also feel that there is a dominantion of the Hindi speaking areas over the others.
Role of governor and President's rule
- The role of governors has always been of controversial issue between the states and the central government.
- The Governor is not an elected office holder.
- The sanskari commission that was appointed by the central government to examine the issue relating to Centre state relation, Recommended that appointment of governor should be strictly non partisan.
- Power and role of governor become controversial for one more reason.
- One of the most contrary serial articles in the constitution is article 356, which provide for president's rule in any state.
- The president's proclamination has to be ratified by Parliament.
- President's rule can be extended till 3 years.
- The governor has the power to Recommend the dismissal of the state government dissolution of state assembly.
- In some cases state governments were dismissed even when they had a majority in the legislature ,as had happened in Kerala in 1959 or without testing their majority, as happened in several other states after 1967 .
- The national movement not only created a pan India national unity : it also generate distinct Unity around a common language ,regional and culture .
- Our national movement was also movement for democracy.
- This ultimately lead to the demand for the creation of article 356 was very sparingly you still 1967.
- After many states had non Congress government and the Congress was in power at the centre .
- The centre government remove elected governments in Andhra Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir in declare of 1980s.
Demand of new state
- The other dimension of tension in our federal system has been the demand to create new lingustice states after independence.
- In December 1953, the state reorganisation Commission was set up and it Recombinant the creation of Lingustic States , at least for the major lingustic group.
- Gujarat and Maharashtra were create in 1960 Punjab and Haryana were separated from each other in 1966 .
- Later , the North Eastern region were reorganised andnew state like Manipur, thirupuram Meghalaya Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh were created.
- In 2000, some of larger states were further divided both to meet the demand for a separate state as well as to meet the need for Greater administrative efficiency.
- Thus Madhya Pradesh Uttar Pradesh and Bihar were divided to create three new state they are Chhattisgarh Uttarakhand Jharkhand respectively.
Interstate conflicts
- It is true that the Judiciary act as the arbitration mechanism on disputes of a legal nature but these disputes are in reality not just legal.
- They have political implications and therefore they can best be resolved only through negotiations and mutual understanding.
- One is the border dispute.
- States have certain claims over territories belonging to neighbouring States.
- One of the long standing border disputes is the dispute between Maharashtra and Karnataka over the city of Belgaum.
- Manipur Nagaland to have a long-standing border disputes.
- The carving out of Haryana from the erstwhile State of Punjab has lead to dispute between the two States not only over border areas,but over the capital city of Chandigarh .
- In 1985, the then prime minister Rajiv Gandhi reached and understanding with the leadership of Punjab .
- Major issue between Tamilnadu and Karnataka
- farmers in both the state are dependent on cauvery waters.
- There is a river water Tribunal to settle water disputes, this dispute has reached the supreme court.
- In another similar dispute Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra battling over sharing the water of Narmada river.
Special provisions
- The most extra-ordinary feature of the Federal arrangement created in India is that many states get a differential treatment .
- In the case of division of power, too the constitution provides a division of powers that is common to all the states.
- The constitution has some special provision for some States given their social and historical circumstances.
- Most of the special provision pertain to the north eastern state largely due to a sizeable indigenous tribal population with the distinct culture which they wish to retain article 371.
- Special provisions also exist for hilly states like Himachal Pradesh and some other state like Andhra Pradesh, Goa Gujarat ,Maharashtra Sikkim and Telangana.
Jammu and Kashmir
- The other state which has a special status in Jammu and Kashmir.
- Jammu and Kashmir was one of the large princely state which had the option of joining India or Pakistan at the Indian time time of independence.
- Most of the Muslim majority States joined Pakistan but there was an exception under this circumstances it was given much greater autonomy by the constitution .
- According to article 370 the concurrents of the state is required for making any laws in matters mentioned in the Union and concurrent list
- In the cases of other states, the division of power as list through the three list automatically applies.
- In the case of Jammu and Kashmir the central government has only limited power and other power list in the union list and concurrent list can be used only with the consent of the state government
- The autonomy of Jammu and Kashmir is much less than what the language of article 370 May suggest.
- The president has issued two constitutional Orders in concurrencee with the Government of J&K making large partsof the Constitution applicable to the state.
- The union government cannot impose a financial emergency in the state and the directive principle do not apply in Jammu and Kashmir .
- finally the amendment to the Indian Constitution concurrent with can only apply in concurrence with the Government of J and K
Tags:
class - 11 Political