Opposition to Ethnic Territorial Autonomy in the Indian Parliament*

Why do central governments resist regional ethnic autonomy? Is it nationalism? A fear of lost revenues? Scholars rarely investigate these questions with fine-grained data on elite behavior. The author analyzes new data on Indian parliamentarians during that country's federal reorganization in the 1950s. Legislators debated dozens of proposals for ethnic autonomy. What kinds of proposals met the most opposition? Contrary to existing theory, central legislators were not opposed to autonomy for revenue- or resource-rich areas. Religious and linguistic nationalism were influential but they did not create a direct relationship between ethnic differences and MPs' stances on autonomy. Regional ethnic rivalries were a key driver of opposition to autonomy. Parliamentarians rebuffed proposals that threatened to undermine their constituents' position relative to neighboring non-coethnics. These findings suggest new insights for the comparative study of ethnoterritorial politics.