If you have ever wondered why the Centre cannot dismiss a State government on a whim, or why President’s Rule under Article 356 is no longer the political weapon it once was, the answer traces back to a Commission most citizens have never heard of the Sarkaria Commission. Set up to fix a trust deficit between the Union and the States, its recommendations quietly became the backbone of how Centre-State relations are read in Indian constitutional law today.
This piece breaks down what the Commission was, what it actually recommended, and — most importantly for law students and junior advocates.what its legal standing is, given that it was never a statutory body.
Background: Why the Commission Was Set Up
The Sarkaria Commission was constituted by the Union Government in June 1983, under the chairmanship of Justice Ranjit Singh Sarkaria, a retired judge of the Supreme Court of India. Its mandate was to examine the relationship and balance of power between the Union and the States across administrative, legislative, and financial spheres, and to recommend changes within the existing framework of the Constitution, it was never asked to rewrite the Constitution, only to make federalism function better within it.
The backdrop mattered: by the early 1980s, Article 356 (President’s Rule) had already been invoked close to a hundred times, often against State governments led by opposition parties, fueling allegations that it was being used as a political tool rather than a genuine constitutional remedy. The Commission submitted its report in 1988, running to nearly 1,600 pages with 247 recommendations.
Nature and Function of the Commission
It is important to be precise here for exam and drafting purposes: the Sarkaria Commission was not a constitutional body (it does not derive its existence from any Article) and not a statutory body either (it was not created under an Act of Parliament). It was an advisory commission set up by an executive resolution of the Union Government, similar in legal character to bodies constituted under the Commissions of Inquiry Act framework, though its core function was recommendatory rather than investigative.
Its functions can be grouped as follows:
- Reviewing Centre-State arrangements across legislative relations (Articles 245–255), administrative relations, and financial relations (devolution of resources, grants-in-aid).
- Examining the role of Governors, particularly their discretionary powers and the manner of their appointment and removal.
- Scrutinising the use of Article 356, given the pattern of its frequent and often controversial invocation.
- Recommending institutional mechanisms for Centre-State coordination — most significantly, it recommended setting up an Inter-State Council under Article 263, a recommendation the Union Government eventually acted on in 1990.
Key Recommendations
A few recommendations are worth knowing because they are the ones courts and Parliament have actually engaged with:
- Article 356 should be a measure of last resort used only after all other options to restore constitutional machinery in a State have failed, and only in cases of actual breakdown of constitutional machinery, not mere maladministration.
- Prior warning to the State government before recommending President’s Rule, except in cases of extreme urgency.
- Material facts and grounds should be made an integral part of the proclamation under Article 356, so that it is open to judicial scrutiny.
- The Assembly should not be dissolved until the proclamation is approved by both Houses of Parliament under Article 356(3).
- Governors should not act as agents of the Centre their discretionary power should be exercised sparingly and within constitutional limits, and the practice of using Governors to destabilise State governments was specifically discouraged.
- Setting up a permanent Inter-State Council to institutionalise Centre-State and inter-State consultation.
Constitutional Validity: Recommendatory, Not Binding
This is the point students most often get wrong, so it deserves emphasis: the Sarkaria Commission’s report has no independent legal force. It is not law, it is not a constitutional amendment, and it cannot be “struck down” or “enforced” in the way a statute can. Its validity lies entirely in its persuasive and interpretative value it has shaped executive practice, parliamentary debate, and, most durably, judicial reasoning.
That last point is what gives the Commission real teeth in practice. When the Supreme Court had to draw the outer boundaries of Article 356 in the 1990s, it did not invent a new test from scratch — it substantially adopted the Sarkaria Commission’s own framework for when President’s Rule is and is not justified.
Reference Judgment
S.R. Bommai v. Union of India, AIR 1994 SC 1918 : (1994) 3 SCC 1 (Supreme Court of India, nine-judge Constitution Bench).
In this landmark case, the nine-judge bench examined the dismissal of several State governments under Article 356 and, in doing so, drew on the Commission’s warnings about the routine misuse of the Article, which had by then been invoked roughly a hundred times since 1950.
The Court held that a proclamation under Article 356 is subject to judicial review, that the President’s satisfaction is not beyond scrutiny, and that the floor of the Assembly not the subjective opinion of the Governor is the sole test of whether a government commands a majority. Significantly, the Court itself acknowledged that the Sarkaria Commission’s recommendations on the exercise of power under Article 356 merited serious consideration by all concerned. Bommai is the reason the Sarkaria Commission’s recommendations, though never binding by themselves, now effectively operate as judicially endorsed constitutional practice — and it remains the anchor precedent cited in later cases such as Rameshwar Prasad v. Union of India (2006) on the Bihar Assembly dissolution.
Practical Takeaway
For citizens: the days of a State government being dismissed overnight for political convenience are largely behind us, precisely because the Sarkaria Commission’s caution later adopted by the Supreme Court made such dismissals subject to judicial review.
For junior advocates and law students: when answering a question on Article 356 or Centre-State relations, always frame the Sarkaria Commission as the factual and policy foundation, and Bommai as the judicial ratification that gave those recommendations constitutional teeth. Examiners frequently test whether you can correctly identify the Commission’s non-binding status while still explaining why it functions as binding practice today don’t conflate the two.