LAUSR

ABSTRACT The article refers to the processes that have been critical to the emergence of states as significant categories for the analysis of politics in India after a considerable period of academic neglect. It is in this context that the article considers the following research questions for discussion while referring to the state politics literature: what has been the contribution of the “first generation” of state-specific studies and to what extent has the “second generation” of inter-state comparative studies been able to take this forward? What could be the specific advantages of inter-state studies over single case studies? Finally, the article argues in favour of a need to develop further what may be considered the “third generation” of studies in the discipline, that remain comparative in nature but are in search of a much-nuanced grounded analysis; this would move beyond state-specific or inter-state studies and start taking up intra-state comparative studies, focusing on historical-cultural substate regions that have emerged as political (and economic) units within and across the constituent states of the Indian Union.