Dramatic scenes unfolded at the Niti Aayog meeting in New Delhi last weekend. One major Opposition leader, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who attended the meeting, walked out, protesting her mic had been switched off. Other chief ministers like Tamil Nadu’s MK Stalin and Karnataka’s Siddaramaiah boycotted the meeting entirely. Modi-friendly chief ministers, such as Andhra Pradesh’s Chandrababu Naidu, were given ample time to speak. Banerjee, a stalwart stateswoman, three-time CM, four-time Union minister, and seven-time Member of Parliament, was cut off after just five minutes.
Amid the allegations and counter-allegations, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s claim to uphold the spirit of ‘co-operative federalism’ lies thoroughly exposed. Instead, ‘discriminatory federalism,’ based on a decade of excoriating, bruisingly polarised politics, is now the harsh reality.
When Modi swept into office in 2014, he became only the second sitting chief minister to be catapulted to the prime minister’s chair. The first was the often forgotten ‘humble farmer’ from Karnataka, HD Deve Gowda. As chief minister-turned-prime minister, there were high hopes that Modi, having served as Gujarat CM for nearly 13 years, would be conscious of the rights and privileges of chief ministers. Ten years later, the opposite has occurred.
Modi has turned out to be a highly centralising, authoritarian top-down prime minister who has no respect for chief ministers. He hardly ever takes them into confidence and does not consult them. By abolishing the Planning Commission, a forum where chief ministers would regularly air grievances, consult, and debate with the central government, Modi has deprived regional leaders of a vital platform of self-expression.
Also read: CMs raise issue of ‘demographic management’ during NITI Aayog meeting chaired by Modi
Centre’s discrimination
Niti Aayog, the Modi-created think tank that replaced the Planning Commission, is a purely advisory body functioning under the Ministry of Finance, with its CEO appointed by the prime minister. Chief ministers have been further marginalised by this Modi-made outfit.
Sample the following examples of discriminatory federalism:
West Bengal has not received central funds for MGNREGS since 26 December 2021. Rs 1.16 lakh crore is due from the Centre, and the state government has not received funds for 11 lakh homes sanctioned under the PM Awas Yojana. Additionally, Rs 7,000 crore has been withheld from Bengal under the National Food Security Act simply because the Centre insists that rations must bear the stamp of Modi’s face. In an absurd and almost comical display of partisanship, the Centre has also withheld funds for the National Health Mission, issuing a diktat that all such health centres should first be painted saffron.
Every Opposition-ruled state today has voiced complaints about discrimination in central funding, including Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Karnataka. In Kerala, caps have been placed on taking loans. Karnataka has lost Rs 1.87 lakh crore under the 15th Finance Commission. Tamil Nadu has complained about delays in disaster relief funds to the tune of Rs 38,000 crore. A report by the RBI notes that expenditure by states has a greater impact on the economy than expenditure by the Centre. Yet, the states, Opposition-ruled ones that is, are being starved of funds. Siddaramaiah staged protests in New Delhi on 7 February over the Centre’s “step-motherly” treatment in denying funds. His government has even moved the Supreme Court, appealing for a directive to the Centre to release funds to Karnataka.
There was a marked and rather chilling contrast in the way the Centre approached the floods that hit Gujarat in 2017 and Himachal Pradesh in 2023. In Gujarat, Modi’s home state, the PM undertook aerial surveys of deluged areas, and a Rs 500 crore relief package was immediately announced. In Himachal Pradesh, which endured calamitous flooding in 2023, an Opposition chief minister, Congress’ Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, complained about delays in the Centre’s relief package. Himachal Pradesh repeatedly appealed to the Centre to declare the floods a ‘natural calamity,’ but the requests fell on deaf ears.
When states are hit by devastating natural disasters, to differentiate in delivering relief and welfare simply because the politics don’t match is abominable. When children and the vulnerable face incalculable misery, it is heinous and scandalous to act in this way.
Gaze on the Union Budget 2024. Can there be a more glaring display of discriminatory federalism? An infrastructure bonanza for Bihar, a financial package for Andhra Pradesh—only because these two states happen to be coalition partners of the Modi-led NDA coalition at the Centre. This is constitutionally immoral and ethically repugnant. Every citizen of India has equal rights to the monies of the government of India, which come from taxpayers from across the country. To apportion vast sums to alliance partners only for political reasons is a grave injustice to citizens in other states.
Let us recall that from 2014 to 2018, when Andhra Pradesh was demanding Special Status, the Modi government, then basking in the afterglow of a massive electoral win, had no time to listen to its wishes. Similarly, when Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar was in the Opposition, the government ignored Bihar, leading to loud complaints from Nitish.
But now that Nitish and Naidu are propping up Modi’s throne, they are being publicly embraced and showered in symbolic rose petals. It is cheap, contemptible, and anti-democratic to use the Union Budget to create some sort of absurd hierarchy among states, signalling who is deserving and who is not.
The BJP’s talk of the so-called “double engine” model is totally unconstitutional. What does “double engine” mean? Does it mean that states where the BJP is not in power have no engines? Are Opposition-ruled states only train bogies without engines? So, only where BJP rules both state and Centre can there be two engines? The very concept is atrociously partisan, brazenly anti-democratic and reveals the BJP’s degraded and coarse view of Centre-state relations.
During the Karnataka elections of 2023, BJP president JP Nadda went to the extent of publicly threatening that if Congress came to power, central assistance to Karnataka would be withdrawn. This is not just shocking; it is also diabolical. By wishing ill upon common people if they don’t vote a certain way, Nadda revealed his ignorance about the fact that in a democracy, the citizen is the sovereign or ruler and public benefits cannot be denied by elected representatives.
Operation Lotus
The BJP unfailingly hits the lowest common denominator on every constitutional principle because of its vulgar pursuit of power. Any other party would be embarrassed by this appalling disregard for norms. But the Modi-led BJP is never embarrassed.
Take the occupants of Raj Bhavans in Opposition-ruled states. The Modi-appointed governors—mostly septuagenarian RSS types sent to live in luxurious mansions at taxpayer’s expense—function as satraps of the Modi empire. The Punjab government has even moved the Supreme Court because the Modi-appointed former Punjab governor, Banwarilal Purohit, was not giving assent to bills.
Ditto in Kerala, where the governor, Arif Mohammad Khan, delayed his assent to bills. West Bengal governor CV Ananda Bose believes he is a law unto himself, refusing to submit to an investigation even after serious allegations of sexual assault were made against him by his own employee, and instead charging CM Banerjee with “defamation”. In Tamil Nadu, governor RN Ravi has openly challenged the elected government led by MK Stalin by refusing to read out the government’s address to the Assembly, defying convention.
The BJP treats Opposition governments in states not as democratic comrades but as enemies to be annihilated. That’s why the BJP unleashes war cries like “Opposition-Mukt Bharat”. Nine democratically elected governments or Opposition majorities have been either stymied or toppled through the BJP’s notorious “Operation Lotus”. These include: Arunachal Pradesh (2015-2016), Uttarakhand (2016), Manipur (2017), Goa (2017), Karnataka (2018), Madhya Pradesh (2020), Puducherry (2021), Maharashtra (2022), and Meghalaya (2023). These moves have only widened the trust deficit.
The egregious conduct of the Enforcement Directorate in targeting mostly Opposition leaders, as well as the actions of the CBI against the Opposition, has led to a face-off. West Bengal, having withdrawn the ‘general consent’ to the CBI in 2018, challenged the agency’s move to register cases in the state without the government’s permission in the Supreme Court. A few weeks ago, in a landmark order, the top court held that the state government’s suit was maintainable. The trust deficit has become open confrontation, and if unchecked, it can snowball into a constitutional breakdown. What if state governments began to arrest BJP leaders in a tit-for-tat response?
Modi, as a chief minister-turned-prime minister, has shown blatant disrespect for other CMs. The Centre’s relations with Opposition-ruled state governments have now degenerated into outright hostility. The result is the fracas we saw at the Niti Aayog meeting.
The Modi government’s failure to build bridges is taking a heavy toll on governance. Arresting Opposition chief ministers like Delhi’s Arvind Kejriwal and Jharkhand’s Hemant Soren, and ruling imperiously from Delhi, have pushed the Opposition to a point where it can’t easily co-operate anymore. The elections of 2024 have signalled that the era of the “Supreme Leader” is over. It’s time to decentralise, begin a dialogue and discussion process with chief ministers, and respect regional diversity. Red flags have already gone up in many states. A pushback is coming.
The writer is a Rajya Sabha MP, All India Trinamool Congress. She tweets @sagarikaghose. Views are personal.
(Edited by Ratan Priya)