The Federal Reset, Why India’s Union-State Relations Need a Structural Recalibration
The Constitution of India, while federal in structure, was designed with a pronounced centralising bias. This was not an accident of drafting, but a deliberate response to the circumstances of its birth. The trauma of Partition, the integration of 14 provinces and over 500 princely states, and the pervasive fear that centrifugal forces might threaten the fragile unity of a newly independent nation—all these factors inclined the Constituent Assembly toward a strong Centre.
Yet even in those anxious deliberations, there were voices of clarity. K. Santhanam, a member of the Assembly, offered a prescient warning: the Union’s strength lies not in the indiscriminate accumulation of functions, but in the disciplined refusal of responsibilities that do not properly belong at the national level. “It is in this positive as well as negative delimitation of powers that a real federal system rests,” he observed.
Seventy-six years later, that warning has gone largely unheeded. Despite the consolidation of India’s unity, despite the political maturity of its states, despite the rise of regional parties that have given voice to diverse aspirations, constitutional practice continues to reflect the reflexes of the late 1940s. Centralisation, once defended as a necessity, has hardened into habit.
Now, a new report from the Government of Tamil Nadu’s High-Level Committee on Union-State Relations seeks to challenge that habit. Submitted on February 16, 2026, the report offers a comprehensive review of contemporary federal challenges and makes the case for a fundamental recalibration of the Union-State relationship.
The Centralising Legacy: From Necessity to Habit
The constitutional architecture adopted in 1950 drew heavily from the Government of India Act, 1935—a colonial document designed to centralise power. It concentrated significant authority in New Delhi while assigning a comparatively modest sphere to the states. In the context of 1947, with millions displaced by Partition and hundreds of princely states to be integrated, this centralisation appeared not merely prudent but indispensable.
But history demonstrates a pattern: power assumed in the name of necessity rarely retreats when necessity fades. In the decades that followed, centralising tendencies were reinforced by the dominance of a single national party at both the Union and state levels. This fostered a “high command” culture that attenuated the autonomy of state leadership. Later, the emergence of coalition governments and the rise of regional parties led to a more balanced federal order without endangering unity. Yet the underlying constitutional architecture remained unchanged.
Through successive constitutional amendments, expansive Union legislation in Concurrent List subjects, conditional Finance Commission transfers, and centrally sponsored schemes with rigid templates, the balance of power tilted even further toward the Union. Large ministries in New Delhi now duplicate state functions and often attempt to steer state priorities through micromanagement and procedural oversight. In an inversion of democratic hierarchy, the Union Executive has attempted to override plenary state laws in Concurrent List subjects through subordinate legislation.
The Constitutional Doctrine: Federalism as Basic Structure
This drift sits uneasily with constitutional doctrine. In the landmark S.R. Bommai vs Union of India (1994), the Supreme Court declared federalism part of the Constitution’s Basic Structure. It affirmed that states are not mere appendages of the Centre but are supreme within their allotted spheres. Federalism, the Court held, is a principle rooted in India’s history and diversity, not a matter of administrative convenience.
Despite this judicial affirmation, state autonomy has continued to erode. The erosion occurs through multiple channels: legislative expansion, executive overreach, and judicial interpretations that privilege uniform national solutions over contextual diversity. The cumulative effect is a federal system that operates far from the balance its architects envisioned.
The Illusion of Zero-Sum Competition
Underlying this trajectory is a persistent illusion: that the Union becomes stronger by diminishing the states. In truth, the Union and states are not competitors in a zero-sum contest. They are partners in a shared constitutional enterprise.
India’s size and heterogeneity render centralised policy design inherently limited. No authority in New Delhi, however enlightened, can tailor policy with equal sensitivity to every linguistic region, agricultural ecology, industrial cluster, or labour market. A government that attempts to supervise everything—from space exploration to rural sanitation—inevitably expands in reach but diminishes in effectiveness.
Decentralisation addresses this limitation by enabling parallel experimentation. States can design and test policies at manageable scale, contain failures without national disruption, and allow successful innovations to diffuse horizontally or be adopted nationally. Many of India’s most effective programmes followed precisely this path.
Tamil Nadu’s noon meal scheme, Kerala’s achievements in public health and literacy, and Maharashtra’s employment guarantee initiative all began as state experiments before informing national policy. Over-centralisation suppresses the very diversity of strategies from which innovation and discovery arise.
The Capacity Argument and Its Flaws
Centralists often argue that states lack administrative or technical capacity and therefore require Union intervention. Yet this argument contains a fatal flaw: such intervention stunts the very capacity it claims to remedy, creating a self-perpetuating cycle of dependence.
Parents who do not entrust their children with responsibility, and leaders who refuse to delegate authority, inevitably breed dependence. Governments are no exception. Capacity arises from responsibility, accountability, and the freedom to make—and correct—mistakes. To suggest that India’s states, many comparable in scale to sovereign nations, are inherently incapable and must therefore be subjected to intrusive central control is incompatible with national self-respect.
Moreover, the record of centralisation is unpersuasive. Compared with decentralised federations, global benchmarks, or India’s own aspirations, the centralised model has struggled to deliver universal access, sustained quality, genuine equity, or global competitiveness. Instead, it has produced regulatory creep, chronic underfunding as resources are stretched across expanding mandates, blurred accountability, and gradual erosion of state capacity.
Tamil Nadu’s Federal Vision: From Annadurai to the Rajamannar Committee
Tamil Nadu has long been at the forefront of the federal debate. In 1967, C.N. Annadurai articulated a vision of Union-State relations that remains relevant: the Union must indeed be strong enough to maintain the sovereignty and integrity of India, but that does not mean it should assume control over every subject, such as health or education, which bear no direct nexus to national defence.
His successor, M. Karunanidhi, advanced this philosophy through the maxim, “Autonomy to the States, Federalism at the Centre.” In 1969, he established the first independent Committee on Union-State Relations under Justice P.V. Rajamannar. The Committee’s 1971 report became a landmark in India’s federal debate, laying out a comprehensive case for rebalancing.
Later national commissions—the Sarkaria Commission (1983-88) and the Punchhi Commission (2007-10)—acknowledged the need for rebalancing, though they stopped short of recommending fundamental structural reform. Their reports gathered dust, their recommendations largely unimplemented.
The 2026 Report: A New Blueprint
In April 2025, the Government of Tamil Nadu constituted a new High-Level Committee on Union-State Relations under the chairmanship of Justice Kiran Joseph, a retired Supreme Court judge. The other members were K. Ashok Vardhan Shetty, a retired IAS officer, and Dr. M. Naganathan, a former State Planning Commission vice-chairman. The committee was charged with conducting a comprehensive review of contemporary federal challenges.
Part I of its report, submitted on February 16, 2026, addresses a wide range of issues: the role of Governors, language policy, delimitation, elections, education, health, and the Goods and Services Tax (GST). The report is notable for its non-partisan approach and its grounding in constitutional doctrine.
The Government of Tamil Nadu has presented the report to the public in the hope that it will stimulate informed debate. The objective, as the report’s framers see it, is not to weaken the Union but to “right-size” it—allowing it to concentrate on genuinely national responsibilities while restoring to states the autonomy essential for democracy.
Conclusion: The Reset We Need
India’s federalism is not broken, but it is unbalanced. The centralising reflexes of 1947 have outlived their justification. The nation’s unity is no longer fragile; the idea of India rests on firm and enduring foundations. Yet constitutional practice continues to reflect anxieties that should have been retired decades ago.
A structural reset would not diminish national unity; it would deepen it by aligning authority with responsibility. It would recognise that the Union and states are partners, not rivals. It would trust states to govern in their spheres, and hold them accountable for results.
The Tamil Nadu report offers a blueprint for such a reset. Whether it will meet the fate of its predecessors—admired, debated, and then ignored—remains to be seen. But the conversation it has begun is long overdue.
Q&A: Unpacking the Federal Reset Debate
Q1: What is the central argument of the Tamil Nadu High-Level Committee report on Union-State relations?
A: The central argument is that India’s federal system has become excessively centralised, with the Union government accumulating powers that were not originally intended and that are better exercised at the state level. This centralisation, once justified by the circumstances of Partition and national integration, has hardened into habit and now undermines both state autonomy and administrative effectiveness. The report calls for a “structural reset” or “right-sizing” of the Union—allowing it to focus on genuinely national responsibilities while restoring to states the autonomy essential for democracy and effective governance.
Q2: What constitutional basis is there for challenging centralisation?
A: The report draws on several constitutional foundations. First, the Supreme Court’s judgment in S.R. Bommai vs Union of India (1994) declared federalism part of the Constitution’s Basic Structure and affirmed that states are supreme within their allotted spheres. Second, the Seventh Schedule distributes legislative powers between the Union and states, with states having exclusive authority over many subjects. Third, the report invokes the principle of subsidiarity—that authority is most effective when exercised closest to those affected. The argument is that the Union has overstepped its constitutional bounds through expansive legislation, executive overreach, and conditional transfers.
Q3: How has centralisation actually worked in practice, according to the report?
A: The report identifies multiple mechanisms of centralisation: successive constitutional amendments expanding Union power; expansive Union legislation in Concurrent List subjects that effectively crowds out state law; conditional Finance Commission transfers that allow the Union to steer state priorities; centrally sponsored schemes with rigid templates that leave no room for state adaptation; and large Union ministries that duplicate state functions and micromanage state administration. The cumulative effect, the report argues, is a system where states have formal responsibility but limited autonomy, and accountability is blurred.
Q4: Why does the report argue that centralisation is inefficient?
A: The report makes both theoretical and empirical arguments. Theoretically, India’s size and heterogeneity mean that no central authority can tailor policy with equal sensitivity to every region’s needs. Decentralisation enables parallel experimentation, allowing states to test policies at manageable scale, contain failures, and diffuse successful innovations—as seen with Tamil Nadu’s noon meal scheme or Kerala’s health achievements. Empirically, the centralised model has struggled to deliver universal access, sustained quality, and global competitiveness, while producing regulatory creep, chronic underfunding, and blurred accountability.
Q5: What is the historical significance of Tamil Nadu’s role in this debate?
A: Tamil Nadu has been at the forefront of India’s federal debate for decades. In 1967, C.N. Annadurai articulated a vision of Union-State relations that distinguished national responsibilities from state subjects. In 1969, M. Karunanidhi established the first independent Committee on Union-State Relations under Justice P.V. Rajamannar, whose 1971 report became a landmark. The new 2026 report continues this tradition, offering a comprehensive analysis of contemporary challenges. Tamil Nadu’s consistent advocacy reflects both its distinctive political culture and its experience as a state with strong regional identity and successful policy innovations.
