Revision summary
Recent Centre–State shifts: GST compensation end, cess and surcharge, centrally sponsored schemes, NITI replacing plan bargaining, Governor delays on Bills, Article 370, simultaneous-election talk. The Supreme Court in the Punjab Bills case limited pocket-veto use of Articles 200–201. GST Council remains a federal bargain; CBI consent and cadre rules remain sore. Sarkaria and Punchhi asked for an Inter-State Council, consultation, less cess, and a non-partisan Governor. Trust is procedural — calendars, terms of reference, devolution — not a communiqué. Cooperative federalism is minutes and transfers, not a chapter in a brochure.
Model answer
Introduction
Indian federalism is bargaining inside a strong Union. In recent years the Union has used money, Governors and framework laws more loudly. States have used the Supreme Court and the GST Council. The question asks what changed, and how to put trust back into a structure that still has Article 3 and a single Constitution.
Body
Fiscal recasting
The purse has moved faster than the Seventh Schedule.
- Peg: The five-year GST compensation guarantee ran out; the Union leaned more on cess and surcharge, which do not enter the divisible pool.
- Peg: Centrally sponsored schemes still steer a large part of State budgets; the Fifteenth Finance Commission used 2011 population figures and attached conditions to some grants.
- Peg: NITI Aayog replaced the Planning Commission: more a think-tank, less a table at which States bargained plan money.
Institutional and administrative recasting
Offices that were meant to be a buckle have been read in State capitals as a bit.
- Peg: Governors in several Opposition-ruled States sat on Bills; in State of Punjab the Court read Articles 200 and 201 as not allowing a pocket veto.
- Peg: Union terms of reference to Finance Commissions, and the Kovind simultaneous-election design, are read as an attempt to set the political calendar from Delhi.
- Peg: The 2019 reorganisation of Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 was a federal shock of another kind.
- Peg: Several States withdrew general consent for the CBI; All India Services cadre rules and “one nation” platforms for ration and identity leave States as implementers more than designers.
Measures for trust
Sarkaria and Punchhi already wrote the homework.
- Peg: A living Inter-State Council (Article 263), consultation before Bills that eat into the State list, and Governors who are not extra Chief Ministers.
- Peg: A Finance Commission whose terms of reference are not a Union manifesto; less cess, more devolution; centrally sponsored schemes that States can opt and adapt.
- Peg: Opposition-ruled States in the room — GST rate talks, service postings, disaster money — without treating dissent as anti-national.
- Peg: Codify Bill timelines as a convention so the Union does not need a mandamus to forward a file; let the GST Council’s dispute mechanism work before the Court is the first stop.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD U[Union] --> M[Cess CSS NITI] U --> G[Governor Bills] S[States] --> SC[Supreme Court] S --> GST[GST Council] ISC[Inter-State Council] --> T[Trust] M --> T
Conclusion
Recent years tightened Union money and gubernatorial delay, then the Court pushed back on Bills. Trust will return through Inter-State Council habit, cleaner devolution and Governors who sign — not through another slogan about cooperation.
Quick related
Students also ask
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Explain the significance of the 101st Constitutional Amendment Act. To what extent does it reflect the accommodative spirit of federalism?
Next question on this syllabus topic (2023 · Q15). View answer →
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Did GST end federalism?
It pooled tax power. It did not end States. Cess outside the pool is the sharper recent grievance.
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Is a strong Union un-federal?
The text is a strong Union. Federalism here is fair process inside that text, which Sarkaria already assumed.
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More from this topic
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Examine the evolving pattern of Centre-State financial relations in the context of planned development in India. How far have the recent reforms impacted the fiscal federalism in India?
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Q15 · UPSC Mains 2023 · GS II · 15 marks
Explain the significance of the 101st Constitutional Amendment Act. To what extent does it reflect the accommodative spirit of federalism?
Federal Structure and Devolution
The 101st Constitutional Amendment, 2016, introduced GST through Articles 246A, 269A and 279A. It subsumed many Union and State indirect taxes into CGST, SGST and IGST. The GST Council gives States two-thirds vote weight and the Union one-third, with a three-fourths decision rule. Five-year compensation was the federal bargain; dual GST kept States as taxing governments. Mohit Minerals held Council recommendations not strictly binding law. Accommodation is real in design and strained in revenue politics after compensation.
Q11 · UPSC Mains 2021 · GS II · 15 marks
The jurisdiction of the Central Bureau of Investigation(CBI) regarding lodging an FIR and conducting probe within a particular state is being questioned by various States. However, the power of States to withhold consent to the CBI is not absolute. Explain with special reference to the federal character of India.
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Police is a State List subject; the CBI enters a State under the DSPE Act, 1946, mainly through Section 6 consent. General consent was the administrative convenience; Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal showed it can be withdrawn, forcing case-specific permission for new FIRs. The power is not absolute: court-ordered probes, Union Territories, and already-attached investigations are not killed by a political letter. Vineet Narain insulated the agency’s working; it did not abolish federal consent. A clear CBI statute would reduce standoffs without pretending India has a U.S.-style dual police sovereignty.
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