State Politics in Contemporary India

This volume examines Indian states as analytical units, culminating in a comprehensive sociopolitical study of the country as a whole. The state-specific essays underline the federal context in which politics in India unfolds at the ground level.

Employing a federalist and centrist analytical prism, this book aims to add to the existing body of work on state politics, with a particular focus on India in the last decade, which has shown visible shifts in political terms. It delineates the narratives and trends in politics at the state level and explores the range of issues and actors involved in it. It shows the myriad complex, overlapping and multidimensional ways in which politics unfold at the state level and goes on to make a national impact.

The volume will be indispensable to scholars and researchers of South Asian politics, federalism, and contemporary India.

Yatindra Singh Sisodia is a Professor and Director at Madhya Pradesh Institute of Social Science Research, Ujjain (an ICSSR Institute). His areas of research interest are democracy, decentralised governance, electoral politics, tribal issues, and developmental issues. He has been conferred with the Professor G. Ram Reddy Social Scientist Award (2017). He has authored/edited 23 books, including Electoral Narratives of Democracy and Governance in Contemporary India (edited with Pratip Chattopadhyay), Routledge (2025); Political Communication in Contemporary India (edited with Pratip Chattopadhyaya), Routledge (2023); Electoral Dynamics in the States of India, (edited with Sandeep Shastri, Ashutosh Kumar), Routledge (2021); and How India Votes (edited with Ashutosh Kumar), OBS (2019). He is the Editor of two UGC-CARE-listed Journals: Madhya Pradesh Journal of Social Sciences and Madhya Pradesh Samajik Vigyan Anushandhan Journal. He has extensively written in refereed journals and participated in academic events. He has completed various government-funded research projects for various central ministries, state ministries, and organisations like ICSSR, Planning Commission, and ISRO. He has made academic visits to the United States under IVLP, the United Kingdom, South Korea, Malaysia, Dubai, and Bangladesh.

Ashutosh Kumar is a Professor of Political Science at Panjab University, Chandigarh, India. He was the Dr. T. N. Seshan Chair Professor (visiting), India International Institute of Democracy and Election Management, Election Commission of India during 2022-23. His areas of specialisation include electoral and federal dynamics in Indian states. His research papers have been published in national and international journals such as India Review, South Asia Research, Asian Ethnicity, Journal of Asian and African Studies, Economic and Political Weekly, Studies in Indian Politics, and Seminar. He has also authored and edited books related to Election Studies in India with a focus on states.

Pratip Chattopadhyay is an Associate Professor and former Head of the Department of Political Science, University of Kalyani, Nadia, West Bengal. He obtained his PhD from University of Calcutta on the position of Marxist political parties on Indian foreign policy (1991–2009). He was an Associate of UGC-IUS at IIAS Shimla from 2014 to 2016 and an Executive Committee Member of the West Bengal Political Science Association from 2013. He has authored/edited Electoral Narratives of Democracy and Governance in Contemporary India (edited with Yatindra Singh Sisodia), Routledge (2025); Political Communication in Contemporary India (edited with Yatindra Singh Sisodia), Routledge (2023); and Domestic Roots of Indian Foreign Policy: Experiences of Marxist Political Parties in UF (1996-98) and UPA (2004-08) Government. He has published over 60 articles in journals like India Review, Indian Journal of Public Administration, South Asia Survey, Critique, etc. and has made presentations at national and international conferences in India and abroad (Canada, South Korea and Bangladesh). Presntly, he also acts as Board Member of Research Committee 34 (Quality of Democracy), International Political Science Association.