States are sovereign in their domain

There have been charges and counter-charges, personal attacks and complaints of violation of the model code of conduct by political parties and leaders against each other in the Karnataka election campaign, but one at the fag end of it has attracted unusual attention. That is the BJP’s complaint to the Election Commission (EC) about Congress leader Sonia Gandhi’s reported statement in Hubballi that the party “would not allow anyone to pose a threat to Karnataka’s reputation, sovereignty and integrity”. The BJP complained that the statement amounted to advocating “secession” from the country. The EC has asked the Congress to clarify or rectify the matter.

The charge of secession has been raised on the assumption that only the Union has the attribute of sovereignty, and that to claim it for a state of the Union is to argue for secession. This is an erroneous idea. B R Ambedkar had himself made the idea clear in the Constituent Assembly. He said: Our Constitution is a Federal Constitution which has established “a dual polity consisting of the Union at the Centre and the states at the periphery, each endowed with sovereign powers to be exercised in the field assigned to them respectively by the Constitution”. There cannot be a better exposition of the idea of sovereignty in the Indian political system, and that too by its foremost exponent. The sharing of sovereignty is a feature of the federal system, which is a basic feature of the Constitution. There is a division of powers between the Union and states in a Union of states -- which India is -- and they share sovereignty, too, with the states exercising it in their domain. There are Supreme Court pronouncements also that endorse this idea.

This can also be understood and expressed in terms of the relationship between the people and the State. The people are the sovereign and, “we, the people’’ surrender our sovereignty to the State in a contract, in return for protection and welfare. The State is not the nation or merely the central government. Sovereignty is shared by the Centre, the states and even elected bodies like the municipal corporation, which are all associations and entities of the State, to the extent to which they are allocated the functions of the State. So, a reference to the “sovereignty” of a state of the Union of India does not amount to “advocating for secession” as the BJP has made it out to be. It is unfortunate that the Election Commission should seek an explanation from the Congress on this. Individuals, political parties and even Prime Ministers can get away with constitutional illiteracy or misinterpretation, but constitutional bodies are expected have a better sense of the Constitution.