On the Centre–State Fiscal Relations

This is in response to the article titled “Cooperative or Coercive Federalism: Union Budget 2021–22” by Arvind Awasthi and Siddharth Shukla (EPW, 20 March 2021).

I do not know why some amongst the academic community think that there is a conflict in centre–state fiscal relationship and the states are always at the receiving end. If the idea is to maximise revenue using equitable means and if the objective is to be fair to all, there is no reason for the states to make unreasonable claims or to worry about the worsening centre–state fiscal relationship.