‘The real success of federalism in …

The real success of federalism in India can be attributed to the nature of democratic politics in our country. This ensured that the spirit of federalism, respect for diversity and desire for living together became a shared ideal in our country. This happened through the following ways:

• Linguistic States: After the independence of India in 1947, many states were created based on the languages which were spoken by the people such as Maharashtra, Punjab and West Bengal.
• Language Policy: The leaders of our country adopted a very cautious attitude while forming the language policy. While Hindi, spoken by about 40% of our population, was declared as the national language, many languages were also recognised as Scheduled Languages by the Constitution. Apart from Hindi, there are 21 scheduled languages.

• Centre–State Relations: After Independence, there were only few parties which formed governments at the centre and at the state levels. However, the condition improved after 1990 when many regional parties emerged in different states. THis led to an era of power sharing.