p I did not know that I would be asked such a question as this, although for us it is very very important And, I should be very brief.

p During the freedom struggle we had the perception that after we became free,India will be sort of a federal, have federal structure in the Constitution. But in that, because there are so many languages prevailing in India, very developed languages, that on a linguistic basis the states should be formed. This has always been our view even during the freedom struggle. So after freedom that happened, although there were some objections by the Congress party which was the major ruling party and people had to struggle in various areas for the formation of states on the basis of language. Anyway that happened.

p Later on, although we see mat our Constitution is federal in structure, but really throughout the long years there has been an attempt at centralisation. Even concerning the powers which were there tinder the Constitution for the states. The states had certain functions to perform, and the Centre had certain other functions to perform, which the state cannot perform. So what we have been saying is that this decentralisation of power is absolutely necessary in order to strengthen India. We say, unlike the Congress party, we need a strong centre, because India is a vast country, we need a very strong centre and that cannot happen, cannot come about unless the states also become strong. By denying the states their powers, you cannot make the Centre strong by the military and the police and all the authority that you have. That is why on the question of what we call Centre-State relations in our federal structure, we, when we came to government 16yearsback, prepared a paper from 377 West Bengal for discussion. We said it is not necessary that everybody should accept it But we want to have a discussion on it. And what is this, we call the majesty of the federal system? Long debate took place. And when Indira Gandhi was alive, just before the elections she was facing, it got so much support (these discussions) that she set up a commission - Sarkaria Commission it was called - to go into the question of federalism - centre-state relations. At long last after a lot of delay that report came. We are not satisfied with many parts of that report. But even the financial part, with which we are more or less satisfied - that financial powers are being taken away from us, even what was accepted in the Constitution — that is more and more centralisation. So we say, that the states are nearest to the people, the people demand so many things from the states. And in our five year plans also it was quite clear, the directive there that the states have to carry out certain functions, in the interests of the people. But we say where is the wherewithal, where do we have the funds? You are taking away all the funds. We are left with very little resources; As far as we can make out we do not even have the powers, which a state in the US has. We are very much dependent on the Centre. That became further clear to us - where the communist or communist-led Left governments were formed in India, immediately discrimination began apart from the general picture.

p So what happened was, to be brief, we asked the central government - we asked them to call a meeting of all the Chief Ministers, to whichever party they belonged - and such meetings, my experience has been that although the Congress Chief Ministers were afraid to speak up, but they agree with us and during the recess when we have tea, they say that you have spoken very well, this is our demand also but you know our position, but how can we speak up when the Prime Minister is our leader etc. So this has gained ground.

What we have done in West Bengal is, whilst fighting for these demands, we say strong centre cannot be there without strong states. So give us those powers, decentralise those powers in the economic, political field etc and accordingly some changes in the Constitution will also be necessary that will strengthen India. When we say that we say but we are honest to ourselves, to our people. In our state what we have done is to decentralise power. When we had the government in Kerala twice, we did the same thing. In Tripura we did the same thing. So what we have done here 378 in the state, is to decentralise powers to the panchayats as we call them, local governments in the villages. Every five years we have elections, vte have a law in that respect, because we respect democracy. Whether we win or lose, elections must be held every five years both for the local government in the cities - the municipalities and the municipal corporations and the village panchayats. This time on the 30th of May about 30 million people will vote in the villages for these panchayats - this is the fourth panchayat elections that we are going to have. In the earlier elections, we now control about 70% of the panchayats, there are about 68,000 seats that will be contested by various parties. This has helped us very much in the countryside particularly. Now 50% of our state budget we spend through the panchayats and the municipalities. They take the initiative. They are involved in the planning process right from down to the state centre. This is the pattern we are placing before the people of India and fortunately in the parliament which is in session a legislation has been adopted where also reservation (which we have already done) for women - 30%, for the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes we have reservation of seats. This is what we mean by decentralisation of power it helps us to involve people in the planning process, in the political field, in the economic field. Their consciousness is raised and roused, that helps us for the future.