Federalism is entirely unsuited to the needs of a collectivist age. Vast plans of national development await immediate enforcement. It will be a crime against the people of India to set up obstacles and hurdles in the form of part-States in the path of the Central authority which has to tackle the fourfold problems of illiteracy, poverty, communalism and provincialism. Those who talk of federalism, regionalism, provincial autonomy and linguistic provinces do not fully comprehend that they are talking the language of a bygone age. These concepts were appropriate to the needs of the 19th century when industrialism was in its incipient stage. These instruments of political organisation suit the requirements of agricultural communities interspersed over a wide area. Today the picture is entirely changed. We are thinking in terms of a world State which must be vested with all powers to regulate the problems of migration of people from overpopulated zones to areas which are under populated. The world State will have all powers to regulate the entire economic wealth of humanity. The existence of Nation-States has become an anomaly and a hindrance in the path of human progress and welfare. The dominant tendency of the age is towards greater concentration of power in the hands of some sovereign international authority. To talk of sub-national groups and federalism is to put back the hands of the clock. We do not know what will happen to India if a world war breaks out. If India gets an opportunity to build up the nation for a period of ten years at least, she will be in a position to meet the onslaughts of international powers. If India proceeds on collectivist lines unhampered by any provincial or federal part-States, she may be in a position to meet the challenge of the third world war. India lags centuries behind the Great Powers of the world. We must skip over certain stages of development and compress centuries into moments if we are to survive the forces of reaction both external and internal. By adopting parliamentary federalism we shall be playing into the hands of our enemies. A divided Germany, a vivisected Korea, pre-eminently fits into the political plans of international gangsters. A divided India provides some security to those who have plans of their own. The incorporation of federal principles in that part of India which has been left to us will provide hundred percentsecurity to those Jingoes and Junkers who survive on loot and plunder. No foreign power wants a strong Central Government in India. A strong Central Government in India will embarass all. It is suicidal to divide powers into federal, concurrent and provincial. Any such division of powers will weaken the hands of the nation on all fronts.
