The Prime Minister Narendra Modi appealing to the Chief Ministers gathered at the recent Governing Council Meeting of NITI Aayog in New Delhi that the Centre and States to come together as ‘Team India’ to propel the country forward, is a good idea; but it belies reality. Several CMs, especially those from the non-NDA parties attending the meeting expressed their grave concerns about the discriminatory way the Union government treats them. Currently, the Centre-States relationship is a one-way street where the Centre resorts to a carrot and stick approach to make the States bow with its wishes. The SC had in a recent historic judgment underlined the right of the state legislatures to legislate and ordered that the governors, the Union government which controls them, have no right to exercise a pocket veto on the laws state legislatures pass. PM Modi, who had earlier served as chief minister before moving to the national capital as Prime Minister, must understand the constraints under which states function. It's time the PM resolves the complaints of the states with respect to the allocation of resources and intervention in the running of their governments.
