The Concurrent List has become the principal arena of Union-State legislative friction. Discuss with examples, and suggest institutional mechanisms to resolve it.

List III of the Seventh Schedule gives both Parliament and the States the power to make laws on the same subjects. Under Article 254, a Union law prevails over a conflicting State law unless the President assents to the State law. Shared power with a central override has made the Concurrent List the main site of legislative conflict.

Why friction concentrates in List III

• Centralising amendments: the 42nd Amendment (1976) moved education and forests from the State List to the Concurrent List. This widened the Union's reach into areas the States once controlled.
• Repugnancy and assent: a State law that departs from a Union law depends on Presidential assent, which the Union effectively controls. Governors' delays in giving assent add a further veto point. In State of Tamil Nadu v. Governor of Tamil Nadu (2025), the Supreme Court addressed such delays.
• Little prior consultation: the Union often legislates on Concurrent subjects without consulting the States first.

Examples

• Education (Entry 25): Tamil Nadu's 2021 Bill to exempt students from NEET relied on a High Level Committee's finding that the exam disadvantaged rural and government-school students. The Bill then waited for the President's assent [1].
• Agriculture marketing: the 2020 farm laws used the "trade and commerce" entry in List III to regulate agricultural markets, which affect a State subject. After sustained protests they were repealed in 2021.
• Forests: the Forest (Conservation) Amendment of 2023 drew objections from States that saw it as reducing their role.

Institutional mechanisms

• Make the Inter-State Council work (Art. 263): it should meet regularly, have a permanent secretariat, and review Concurrent List Bills before they are introduced, as the Sarkaria Commission advised.
• Make reform reports binding to act on: Sarkaria made 247 recommendations, but by 2001 only 108 had been implemented [2]. The last 17 were decided only in 2003 [3]. The Inter-State Council's Standing Committee finished discussing Punchhi's 273 recommendations only in 2018 [4]. Fixed timelines and action-taken reports are needed.
• Time limits on assent: set deadlines for decisions under Arts. 200, 201 and 254(2), and require written reasons for refusal.
• GST Council model: create rule-based forums with voting for shared policy areas.
• State-level expert bodies: give them statutory backing so their work continues when the State government changes.

The Concurrent List was designed for cooperation, but repugnancy rules and unilateral Union action have turned it into a source of conflict. Regular consultation, binding follow-up on reform reports and time-bound assent can restore the cooperative federalism the Constitution intended.