Perspective on Decentralisation (First Published in Vol.10, No.5, July, 1991)

Over the last few years, there has been an emerging consensus - across political parties and ideological divisions — on the necessity of decentralization for fulfilling the democratic aspirations of the Indian people. Despite differences in points of departure underlying this in various ‘consensus’ (as_ reflected party manifestos), it is a good time to go over the debate on decentralizaon tithat had preceded this consensus. I shall try to do this in this paper.