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Bhatia, Gautam

The Indian Constitution : A conversation with power / Gautam Bhatia - Gurugram HarperCollins Publishers 2025 - xxvi, 347 pages 24 cm

Contents:
Prologue A Question of Power;
1. Power Decentralized: Federalism;
2. Power Divided: Parliamentarianism;
3. Power Dispersed: Pluralism;
4. Power Confronted: Institutions;
5. Power Contained: Rights;
6. Power Unbound: The People;
Interlude: Yesterdays Tomorrow;
Epilogue: State, Pruer, and the Future of Constitutionalism;
Aknouledgements;
Notes;
Index

Ever since its creation, the Indian Constitution has been a deeply studied and debated document. It has been discussed, dissected and debated upon by citizens, scholars, lawyers and politicians. The Constitution’s breadth and ever-evolving character has made it a continuing terrain of debate.
The Indian Constitution: Conversations with Power takes a new approach in discussing the Constitution: as a document that creates, shapes, channels, and constrains power. It shows how the seventy-five years of constitutionalism in India have been characterized by a centralizing drift: that is, a drift towards centralized and homogenous power located within the union executive. It also examines how certain Supreme Court judgments, especially in recent years, have accelerated this drift towards centralization.
However, the author argues, this centralization of power is not inevitable. It is for the citizens of India to decide, ultimately, what vision(s) of constitutional power they want to adopt and give to themselves through the Constitution.
A timely and critical interrogation of the Constitution through the lens of power, this book asks certain fundamental, first-principle questions about the Indian Constitution that all citizens need to think about.

ISBN: 9789365693751 (Paperback)

Dewey Class. No.: 342.5402