Indian Cabinet and Politics

Indian Cabinet and Politics is in a sense a pioneer work inasmuch as it is the first analytical and empirical study of the actual working of the Indian Cabinet. It describes the composition and functioning of the Union Cabinet resulting from the day to day interaction with party politics, focusing mainly on the period 1967 to 1997. It is the first comprehensive book to deal extensively with the question of dismissal of the Prime Minister, both in constitutional terms and in terms of political reality and dynamics. The first chapter, the Place of Cabinet in the Indian Political System, defines the Cabinet in terms of Power Mechanism and goes on to analyse the dynamics of power through the Cabinet and the Prime Minister and the Ministerial changes. Chapter IX, on Challenges to the Cabinet, specially the refutation of the thesis on Prime Ministerial Government is an original interpretation and thesis developed by the author. The Chapter on Cabinet Reforms, the proposal of an alternative model, in particular, is an original contribution of this study. This is also largely true of Chapter VII, Cabinet and Parliament. Much of the information in this book is based on primary source material which was the personal collection of the author during the past 30 years (1967 onwards) and which is not readily available today. This is amply borne out by Chapters III to VIII.