AUTONOMY MOVEMENTS AND FEDERAL INDIA

This book deals with the urges and aspirations of some ethnic communities to acquire, through socio-political movements, some measure of control over societal resources like political power, economic endowment and social status. Their goals vary from total independence to degrees of autonomy within the constitutional federal framework. Some movements have arrived at their consummation: the Mizo settling for a state when they had aimed at independence and the Jharkhand movement winning a state of the same name. A few others are still struggle-locked wayfaring: for the Naga movement some light is visible at the end of the tunnel; the Bodo movement remains tied in knots; and the J&K imbroglio seems to have acquired an awesome intractability.

In this book, the Indian Constitution is visualised as an architecturally multi-faceted modern edifice of accommodative versatility. Given the will and capability of political management, the multiplying demands of a tumultuous polity are not difficult of being lodged therein. It is emphasised that realisation of the potential of the now constitutionally-mandated radical panchayat system is essential for a comprehensive harmony of the total architectural design of a federal India.

What lends the book a unique and authentic flavour is the fact that the author has been an active participant in Jharkhand, Bodo and Naga movements on both sides of the divide—officially on the authority’s side but emotionally and morally on the protagonists’ side.