"India, That Is Bharat”: Reassessing the Founding Fathers’ Vision of A ‘Union of States’: After Seventy Years of Constitutional Experimentation

Abstract

The constitutional declaration that “India, that is Bharat, shall be a Union of States” represents a distinctive departure from classical federal models grounded in inter-state compacts and divided sovereignty. Conceived amid the upheavals of Partition, princely integration, and profound social heterogeneity, the Indian Union was not assembled from pre-existing sovereign units but instituted through a deliberate constitutional design intended to secure political unity while accommodating enduring diversity. This article revisits that founding formulation more than seven decades after constitutional inauguration to examine how the idea of the “Union of States” has functioned as both a structural principle and a mode of governance over time. Drawing on Constituent Assembly Debates, constitutional architecture, judicial interpretation, and evolving political practice, the paper analyses whether the original federal imagination has been preserved, reconfigured, or substantively transformed. Situating India within the framework of “holding-together” federations, it critically examines contemporary developments in fiscal governance, cooperative and competitive federalism, asymmetrical constitutional arrangements, and Sixth Schedule institutions. The article argues that Indian federalism is best understood not as an imperfect approximation of classical federalism but as a dynamic constitutional experiment whose resilience lies in its capacity for calibrated adaptation. At the same time, it shows that while the founding vision of the Union has remained formally intact, its normative force is increasingly mediated by political practice, institutional constraint, and the demands of constitutional morality.