CDS (I) 2022 General Knowledge · Question 49 of 120

Correct — A, The federating units consented to form a union. Indian federalism did not begin with an agreement among pre-existing States. Article 1 says India, that is Bharat, shall be a Union of States, and the Drafting Committee chose that word deliberately: presenting the Draft Constitution on 4 November 1948, Dr B.R. Ambedkar explained that the Union was not the outcome of any compact between the States, and that because it rested on no such agreement no State could claim a right to secede from it. The units were carved out of British Indian provinces and acceding princely States by a Constituent Assembly acting for the whole country, and Parliament can still under Article 3 form new States, alter areas and change boundaries and names without a State's consent being binding on it. The other three options are all genuine features of the Indian scheme.

• (b)Residuary powers vest with the Centre — This is a real feature, and one of the strongest markers of the Indian tilt towards the Centre. Residuary power belongs to Parliament under Article 248, read with the last entry of the Union List — the opposite of the United States arrangement, where what is not delegated is reserved to the States.
• (c)Single citizenship — Single citizenship is a real feature too. There is one Indian citizenship and no separate citizenship of a State, unlike the United States where a person is a citizen of the nation and of a State at the same time.
• (d)An extensive Union and Concurrent list — Also real. The Union List is much the longest of the three legislative lists, and the Concurrent List is substantial as well, with Union law prevailing in a conflict — the constitutional design of a strong Centre rather than an argument against it.

India's Constitution sets up a federal structure with a pronounced unitary bias. There is a division of powers across three lists, a written and largely rigid Constitution, an independent judiciary and bicameralism at the Centre — all federal features. Against them sit single citizenship, a single integrated judiciary, an All India Services cadre serving both levels, residuary power with the Centre, Parliament's authority to redraw State boundaries and the emergency provisions. The phrase most often used for the result is a federation with a strong centralising tendency, or in Ambedkar's own framing an indestructible Union of States.

All four options describe features of a federation of some kind, so the discriminating question is which of them describes India in particular. Consent of the units is the one that belongs to the American story, where thirteen sovereign States negotiated their way into a union and where the question whether they could leave it had to be settled by a civil war. India's units never had that standing, and the Constitution takes care to say so — hence Union rather than Federation in Article 1, and hence Article 3, which lets Parliament create or reshape a State on a simple majority after merely seeking the views of the State legislature. Watch the phrasing in items like this: options (b), (c) and (d) all sound like criticisms of Indian federalism, and a candidate who reads them as complaints rather than as descriptions may pick one of them by mistake.

• Article 1(1) reads: India, that is Bharat, shall be a Union of States.
• Presenting the Draft Constitution on 4 November 1948, Ambedkar explained that Union was used to make clear that the States have no right to secede.
• Under Article 3 Parliament may form new States and alter areas, boundaries or names, the State legislature's view being sought but not binding.
• Residuary powers of legislation vest in Parliament under Article 248, unlike the American model where they are reserved to the States.
• India has single citizenship — there is no separate citizenship of a State.

• Reading the word federal into Article 1 — the Constitution says Union of States and never uses federation there.
• Assuming that features which strengthen the Centre are therefore not features of Indian federalism.
• Carrying American assumptions across — dual citizenship and reserved residuary powers belong to that model, not to India's.

As an odd-one-out among the features of Indian federalism, as a comparison item against the United States, or through Article 1 and the choice of the word Union.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Residuary powers of legislation in India vest in

  • (a)the State legislatures
  • (b)Parliament
  • (c)the President
  • (d)the Inter-State Council

  Answer(b) Parliament — under Article 248 read with the residuary entry of the Union List, which reverses the American arrangement.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Under which Article may Parliament form a new State by separating territory from an existing State?

  • (a)Article 1
  • (b)Article 2
  • (c)Article 3
  • (d)Article 4

  Answer(c) Article 3 — Article 2 covers the admission or establishment of new States, while Article 3 deals with reorganising existing ones.