Mind the North-South gap

Nilakantan RS' book explores the multidimensional gap between the two halves of India

South vs North: India's Great Divide

Author: Nilakantan RS

Publisher: Juggernaut

Pages: 269

Price: Rs 599

In 1948, when lawmakers were deciding the shape of Indian democracy, one of the pivotal questions discussed was how to conduct elections in a country as large and diverse as India. They needed to ensure that the system was simple enough for a largely illiterate population to understand and robust enough to suppress voices of secession. The first-past-the-post system (FPTP), although imperfect, satisfied all the criteria at the time. B R Ambedkar believed that along with reservations, the election system would obviate the need for proportional representation, which was the demand at the time.

 Although the system was relevant in terms of addressing India’s needs then, is it good enough to handle the country’s requirements today? Questions have, time and again, been raised about the effectiveness of the FPTP system in Indian democracy as it has evolved today. More important, as 2026 draws closer, there are debates on adequate representation from all the regions of the country. India is scheduled to carry out a major delimitation exercise in 2026, and fears are that the states that have performed better on family planning and other counts will be punished for their progress. If delimitation is conducted on the basis of the number of electors per Member of Parliament, then Uttar Pradesh stands to gain, whereas Kerala and Tamil Nadu will lose. This anomaly in growth is the focus of Nilakantan R S’ work South vs North: India’s Great Divide. The data scientist explores the multidimensional gap between the two regions and highlights the growing chasm between northern and southern India.

The focus of the book is to expose the pitfalls in a centralised system of governance, where the resources flow from richer states to the poorer ones, and government policies are designed to address the laggard regions and not the developed ones.

The book has three parts. The first part has four chapters which indicate the growing divide between the North and South in terms of health, education and economy. The second part has an introduction and three chapters, focusing on the problems with the current system and how it may lead to fissures in the union. The last one presents a solution to put regions on a par with each other and make the South an equal partner in the development of the country. The discussion on election systems and decision-making are the subjects of the third part of the book.

True to his profession, the author deploys data and figures to substantiate his argument and to deconstruct the government’s policy approach. The work is meticulous in its method, as he takes each aspect in detail before delving into suggestions to improve the system. But the assumption that this is a problem unique to India would be misleading. The North-South and East-West divide exists in the developed countries such as Germany and the US as well.

Moreover, while the author is right in highlighting that government policy often does not address the situation in the South, he does not detail that some of these issues fall under the purview of state subjects. For instance, in the case of New Education Policy, while the author highlights that the targets set under the policy have already been achieved by the southern states, he does not address the fact that education, being a state subject, can still be addressed differently by these states to raise the bar even further. After all, southern states outperformed all education policies in the past as well. But the fact does highlight the disregard of a centralised model towards developed regions.

When addressing the electoral system, the author appears to overlook the fact that the system of gamified democracy may not fully address the needs of a country like India, where the population is literate, but not educated enough to understand the nuances of such a system. There is little doubt that the answer to India’s problems lies in a greater devolution of power. In 1992, the lawmakers had the right idea by voting for a further devolution of power to cities and panchayats. But neither northern states nor the southern ones have performed well in that regard. There is a need for less centralisation and the author is right in highlighting that the Union needs to let go of some of that control.

In 1998, while facing the no-confidence motion, then prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee took offence to his party being called a “cow-belt party”. Today, that party has a national character, and as 2026 approaches, lawmakers would do well not to consign the fate of the country to such monikers again.

Mr Nilakantan’s book is an excellent study in demonstrating the North-South divide over generations. The solutions, though complex, are well thought-out and well structured. They certainly warrant a discussion, if not a consideration in the current context.