Write a note on the centre-state relations in India.

Centre-State relations in India:
(i) Restructuring the Centre-State relations is one more way in which federalism has been strengthened in practice.

(ii) The constitutional arrangements for sharing power work in reality depend to a large extent, on how the ruling parties and leaders follow these arrangements.

(iii) For a long time, the same party ruled both the centre and in most of the states. This meant that the state governments did not exercise their rights as autonomous federal units. As and when the ruling party at the state level was different, the parties that ruled at the centre tried to undermine the power of the states. In those days, the Central Government would often misuse the Constitution to dismiss the state governments that were controlled by rival parties. This undermined the spirit of federalism.

(iv) All this changed significantly after 1990. This period saw the rise of regional parties in many states of the country.This was also the beginning of the era of coalition governments at the centre. Since no single party got a clear majority in Lok Sabha, the major national parties had to enter into an alliance with many parties including several regional parties to form a government at the centre. This led to a new culture of power sharing and respect for the autonomy of the state governments. This trend was supported by a majority.