There are parts I agree with, other parts I disagree with.
Centralisation for centralisation sake is bad.
Same as decentralisation for decentralisation sake is bad.
Be it the central govt vs regional.
Or the role of the citizenry compared to say one legal "central" political party in the staffing of the govt for its decision making and law and order.
They (centralised vs decentralised) are not ends to themselves, rather they are means to a greater end.
How do we find the right balance, the right amount of salt to add to a soup.
To me this requires analysis of:
A) The constitution (highest authority) principles (and why)
B) The checks and balances within this constitution (and why)
C) The faithful implementation of the constitution, its amendment process and/or re-convening for replacement (and why)
To me there are clear qualitative differences between every nationstate, even with their context and circumstances accounted for (at the time of nationstate formation and then the course of it afterwards).
Rest is really time and interest invested into deep study of this subject in all the varieties the human species has produced, current time, near-current and historical/archaic.
In China's case the summary of note, is why the Sun-Yat-Sen constitutional drafting commenced under the principles it did (after Qing dynasty was disestablished). Then the long subject of what happened to that (regd compromises KMT made with the CCP, each parties various factions and the turbulence of that time), his relatively early unfortunate demise, the civil war that followed, the nasty invader that entered into China and the impacts these would have regd the 1949 establishment of the PRC with CCP as sole legal political party....with 4 constitutions to follow.
This is ultimately a very different state of events and deep contexts to India across same time period....and India's one sole constitution from 1950.
But we can even start at this midway point in the century (1950) when the nationstates have both established to compare and contrast purely the state-state....and then the state-state for the other axis vectors for China (I listed in previous post) that are very useful to do in my opinion.
You are open minded and want a honest exchange of views, so it will be fruitful....it will just take time to do as it is all about ultimately understanding reality as best as possible. A reality we all share in end, whatever delusions some of us may have inserted to substitute, to act as a personal emotional crutch or otherwise.
Those with less (or little) understanding of reality in this subject, tend to have formed primitive, prejudicial, ignorant conclusions. I only hope its specific to this domain and not a general character trait of theirs.
Sometimes protracted participation with skirmishing posters have made them worse for wear too upon this when it comes to a forum that has existed quite some time with its various bad-faith agents outnumbering good-faith ones.
I generally take a dim view when some post contains terms like "these Indians" or "these Chinese" or "these Pakistanis" etc.. to begin with.
It is an emotional basis first, that forms its various delusions and self-referenced narratives..... and that colours any intake and processing of objective reality from the start.
So it is not surprising if they get stuck running in circles and are unable to comprehend for example, exactly why the USSR broke up (as you will notice in my axis directions earlier w.r.t PRC) with its power/wealth levels attained and 3 constitutions... and India has not with its power/wealth levels and single 1950 constitution.
i.e Was the USSR a case of centralised for centralised sake to some degree and how much?....compared to say India. What is the problem if a political party within India tries to generate sufficient contravention of the balance India found in its constitution that has stood test of time compared to far mightier USSR (that from the other's point of view had utterly no business breaking up like it did with their flawed reductive emotionally biased "logic").
It needs that analysis of A) B) and C) I gave earlier....and maybe especially B (in my opinion).
i.e what are checks and balances, what are their key role w.r.t power and the long term toughness of the state (and nation it accounts for) so it is neither too soft/exposed or too brittle. With optimal balance of the metal's toughness, it can do the most good and most work with best transmission of reality and truth (governing the top-down and bottom-up processes and their respective best roles and qualities).
In my opinon, PRC could have done a lot better job than it has (on A, B and C), but its a really long subject in end to explore well. India has done about as well as it can have done with the 1950 constitution with what it inherited and could learn from the successful nationstate snapshot it had at the time to process.
i.e What's the best reading on it one ought to have done several times over to be competent on it (or whats a basic place to start even).
The inconsistency in the logic of thinking about the study of politics between us has led us to understand some political terms in completely different ways. I can only try to explain some of your questions and points in a Chinese perspective.
China has a complete and rigorous historical record and living habits throughout its thousands of years of history. They have shaped the traditions of the Chinese people today. These traditions take precedence over the law. Or rather, many Chinese laws are based on these traditions. When the state needs to make laws that go against these traditions, it must first do a lot of emotional work to get the general public to accept the new rules from the inside. Otherwise, the Chinese will not pay any attention to these laws and will still continue to live according to these traditions.
Unlike the situation in many countries, the influence of these traditions on the Chinese is far greater than the influence of traditions on the people in other countries, and far greater than the influence of religion on the population.
Ordinary Chinese people know that there are many laws in China, but they do not care about the terms of these laws. This is because they know that what the laws stipulate is basically the same as the traditions they have in their daily lives. Even when the Mongols, Manchus, and Japanese occupied Han Chinese areas throughout history, they had to respect those traditions when they made laws in those places. For example, all Chinese know the traditional concept of ‘killing a man pays for his life’, but few know what the law says about it. It is only when we come across such things that we look up the legal provisions. Of course, society is developing. Many legal provisions are also gradually becoming new traditions for Chinese people.
As for CCP, he respects these traditions and endeavours to lead the people together towards the ideal society of the Chinese. So, it is the Chinese people who choose CCP as their leader, not CCP who is fooling the Chinese people. Compared to traditional Chinese culture, the influence of CCP is negligible. Don't forget, these CCP members, they are firstly Chinese before they are CCP members. If they want to challenge these traditions, they must first challenge themselves.
Therefore, if we try to interpret and study the Chinese Constitution, we might as well study these Chinese traditions. Ordinary Chinese don't care about what's inside the Constitution at all.
If you are interested, try to study Chinese history. China has used various state systems of today's world in its developmental history. Federalism, Constitutional Monarchy, Parliamentary System ............. The only difference is that they are called differently.
Regarding democracy and centralisation: as I said earlier, it's a dynamic property rather than a static one. To describe it more directly: today's India is a centralised state. Past or future, constitution or performance, it doesn't matter. It does now. If you compare carefully, you will see: India and China have different ways of describing and manifesting the relevant provisions of the institutions of power, but the core is the same. How the Supreme Leader is created, the scope of his powers, and the provisions for his term of office ............. The most controversial: India calls it arising from different political parties; China calls it arising from different factions. But their essence is the same, only the description is different, and they are also produced by different political groups.
So I don't think there is any substantial difference between India and China in terms of democracy and centralisation of power.