Tag Archive for: Political system; Participatory politics; Indian state; Federalism; Hindu Nationalism

The elusive and paradoxical nature of Indian polity has been evident in the amalgamation of Western patterns of bureaucratic organization, participatory politics with indigenous practices and institutional framework that had an organic growth on the Indian soil. While post-colonial India was characterized by the incorporation of democratic political ethos and structural architecture, Westminster model of parliamentary government and representative legal institutions, it did not imply the exact replication of the British architectonic system of advanced industrial democracy. As the Indian political process is subjected to dramatic transmutations and cyclical changes, it has eventually acquired a mass character and vibrancy with the exuberant participation of marginalized and underprivileged political formations and social groups in the political arena, coupled with the regionalization of the polity, altering the terms of political domination and sowing the seeds of an increasingly complex mechanism of negotiation, competitive bargaining, alliance and coalition-building, in a cooperative federalist arrangement. The principle objective of this paper is to put an emphasis on the role of the Indian state, the transformation of Indian federalism and the political process, while holistically encapsulating the development and multidimensional patterns associated with the Indian political system, tracing the departure from the heyday of the Congress system and Nehruvian civic nationalism to the crystallization of a majoritarian edifice, propelled by Hindu Nationalism.