Page:White Paper on Indian States (1950).pdf/97

 From this concept of States and Provinces as equal partners' it follows that the Central Government should function in States over the same range of subjects and with the same powers as in Provinces. It is only in this way that the Union of India will gain in strength and its policies in effectiveness. There is no Federation in which the Central Government possesses different levels of power and authority in the units comprised in it. Such differences in jurisdiction from unit to unit are bound to be a source of weakness and to produce a sense of unfairness among the less favoured units which will be fatal to friendly relations and orderly progress.

The Committee therefore rightly conceived federal financial integration "as a necessary consequence of the basic conception underlying the new Constitution of the Union of India," and this clearly involved that the whole project should be grounded upon the following propositions:—

These propositions have been accepted without reserve by all States; but in the course of subsequent negotiations the representatives of some of the Unions urged—and the Government of India readily accepted—the inclusion of the following further proposition:

"There is need for assistance to Unions of States in connection with the internal integration of their administrations and services, and particularly in relation to their development in various directions in view of the undisputed fact that