Centralisation has been the defining characteristic of the Indian state’s politico-economic policy objective irrespective of the political party in power at the federal/central level. This centralisation was viewed as a critical necessity to the making of unified Indian nationhood out of the existing diversities. Centralisation and nationalism reinforcing each other have shaped the economic policy paradigm in the making of Indian capitalism in different phases in the post-colonial period though the forms of that centralising nationalism have changed. This centralising nationalism as a political-economic regulatory framework suffers from internal and external vulnerabilities.