Electoral politics

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SANMATI HIGHER SECONDARY SCHOOL 2013-2014

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it is totaly based on elections

Transcript of Electoral politics

  • 1. GUIDED BY;CHANDAN JAIN MAM

2. We have seen that in a democracy it is neither possible nornecessary for people to govern directly. The most commonform of democracy in our times is for the people to governthrough their representatives.In this PPT we will look at how these representatives areelected. We begin by understanding why elections arenecessary and useful in a democracy. 3. We try to understand how electoral competition amongparties serves the people. We then go on to ask what makes anelection democratic. The basic idea here is to distinguishdemocratic elections from non-democratic elections.The rest of the chapter tries to assess elections in India in thelight of this yardstick. We take a look at each stage ofelections, from the drawing of boundaries of differentconstituencies to the declaration of results. 4. Why Do We Need Elections?Elections take place regularly inany democracy. We noted thatthere are more than one hundredcountries in the world in whichelections take place to choosepeoples representatives . Electionsare also held in many countriesthat are not democratic. 5. Nor is it possible for everyone to have the time and knowledge to takedecisions on all matters. Therefore in most democracies people rulethrough their representatives.We cannot imagine a democracy without elections. A rule of the peopleis possible without any elections if all the people can sit togethereveryday and take all the decisions. But as we have already seen inChapter Two, this is not possible in any large community. 6. Is there a democratic way of selecting representatives withoutelections? Let us think of a place where representatives areselected on the basis of age and experience??? Or a place wherethey are chosen on the basis of education or knowledge???But can we call this place a democracy? How do we find out if thepeople like their representatives or not? How do we ensure thatthese representatives rule as per the wishes of the people??????How to make sure that those who the people dont like do notremain their representatives ????? 7. This requires a mechanism by which people can choosetheir representatives at regular intervals and change themif they wish to do so. This mechanism is called election.Therefore, elections are considered essential in our timesfor any representative democracy.Elections should took place regularly in each and everydemocratic country. 8. In an election the voters make many choices:They can choose who will make lawsfor them.They can choose who will form thegovernment and take major decisions.They can choose the party whosepolicies will guide the governmentand making law. 9. Elections can be held in many ways. All democratic countrieshold elections. But most non-democratic countries also holdsome kind of elections.How do we distinguish democratic elections from any otherelection?There are many examples of countries where elections are heldbut they cant really be called democratic elections. 10. A simple list of the minimum conditionsof a democratic election:First, everyone should be able to choose. This means thateveryone should have one vote and every vote should haveequal value.Second, there should be something to choose from. Parties andcandidates should be free to contest elections and should offersome real choice to the voters. 11. Third, the choice should be offered at regularintervals. Elections must be held regularly after everyfew years.Fourth, the candidate preferred by the people shouldget elected.Fifth, elections should be conducted in a free and fairmanner where people can choose as they really wish. 12. These might look like very simple and easy conditions.But there are many countries where these are notfulfilled. In this chapter we will apply theseconditions to the elections held in our own country tosee if we can call these democratic elections. 13. Elections are thus all about political competition. Thiscompetition takes various forms. The most obvious form is thecompetition among political parties. At the constituency level,it takes the form of competition among several candidates. Ifthere is no competition, elections will become pointless. But is it good to have political competition???? Clearly, an electoral competition has many demerits. It createsa sense of disunity and factionalism in every locality. 14. You would have heard of people complaining of party-politicsin your locality. Different political parties andleaders often level allegations against one another. Partiesand candidates often use dirty tricks to win elections. Some people say that this pressure to win electoral fights doesnot allow sensible long-term policies to be formulated. Somegood people who may wish to serve the country do not enterthis arena. They do not like the idea of being dragged intounhealthy competition. 15. Our Constitution makers were aware of these problems. Yetthey opted for free competition in elections as the way toselect our future leaders. They did so because this systemworks better in the long run. In an ideal world all political leaders know what is good forthe people and are motivated only by a desire to serve them.Political competition is not necessary in such an ideal world. But that is not what happens in real life. Political leaders allover the world, like all other professionals, are motivated by adesire to advance their political careers. They want to remainin power or get power and positions for themselves. 16. They may wish to serve the people as well, but it is risky todepend entirely on their sense of duty. Besides even when theywish to serve the people, they may not know what is requiredto do so, or their ideas may not match what the people reallywant. How do we deal with this real life situation? One way is to try and improve the knowledge and character ofpolitical leaders. The other and more realistic way is to set upa system where political leaders are rewarded for serving thepeople and punished for not doing so. 17. Who decides this reward or punishment? The simple answer is: the people . This is what electoralcompetition does. Regular electoral competition providesincentives to political parties and leaders. They know thatif they raise issues that people want to be raised, theirpopularity and chances of victory will increase in the nextelections. But if they fail to satisfy the voters with their work theywill not be able to win again. 18. So if a political party is motivated only by desire to be inpower, even then it will be forced to serve the people. This is abit like the way market works. Even if a shopkeeper isinterested only in his profit, he is forced to give good service tothe customers. If he does not, the customer will go to some other shop.Similarly, political competition may cause divisions and someugliness, but it finally helps to force political parties andleaders to serve the people. 19. Can we say that Indian elections are democratic????Toanswer this question, let us take a look at how elections areheld in India. Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha (Assembly)elections are held regularly after every five years.After five years the term of all the elected representativescomes to an end. The Lok Sabha or Vidhan Sabha standsdissolved. Elections are held in all constituencies at the sametime, either on the same day or within a few days.This is called a general election. Sometimes election is heldonly for one constituency to fill the vacancy caused by deathor resignation of a member. This is called a by-election. 20. Electoral ConstituenciesYou read about the people of Haryana electing 90 MLAs.You may have wondered how they did that. Did every personin Haryana vote for all the 90 MLAs? You perhaps knowthat this is not the case.In our country we follow an area based system ofrepresentation. The country is divided into different areas forpurposes of elections. These areas are called electoralconstituencies. 21. The voters who live in an area elect one representative. ForLok Sabha elections, the country is divided into 543constituencies. The representative elected from eachconstituency is called a Member of Parliament or an MP.One of the features of a democratic election is that every voteshould have equal value . That is why our Constitutionrequires that each constituency should have a roughly equalpopulation living within it. 22. Similarly, each state is divided into a specific number ofAssembly constituencies. In this case, the electedrepresentative is called the Member of Legislative Assembly oran MLA.Each parliamentary constituency has within it severalassembly constituencies. The same principle applies forPanchayat and Municipal elections. Each village or town isdivided into several wards that are like constituencies.Each ward elects one member of the village or the urban localbody. Sometimes these constituencies are counted as seats,for each constituency represents one seat in the assembly. 23. Reserved Constituencies Our Constitution entitles every citizen to elect her/hisrepresentative and to be elected as a representative. TheConstitution makers, however, were worried that in anopen electoral competition, certain weaker sections maynot stand a good chance to get elected to the Lok Sabhaand the state Legislative Assemblies. 24. LOK SABHA CONSTITUENCIESTOTAL CONSTITUENCIES 543GENERAL 412RESERVED (SC) 84RESERVED (ST) 47 25. STATES CONSTITUENCIESAndhra Pradesh 42Arunachal Pradesh 2Assam 14Bihar 40Chhattisgarh 11Goa 2Gujarat 26Haryana 10Himachal Pradesh 4Jammu & Kashmir 6Jharkhand 14Karnataka 28Kerala 20Madhya Pradesh 29Maharashtra 48Manipur 2Meghalaya 2Mizoram 1Nagaland 1Odisha 21Punjab 13Rajasthan 25Sikkim 1Tamil Nadu 39Tripura 2Uttar Pradesh 80Uttarakhand 5West Bengal 42UNION TERRITORIESAndaman & NicobarIslands 1Chandigarh 1Dadra & Nagar Haveli 1Daman & Diu 1Delhi 7Lakshadweep 1Puducherry 1 26. They may not have the required resources, education andcontacts to contest and win elections against others. Thosewho are influential and resourceful may prevent them fromwinning elections. If that happens, our Parliament andAssemblies would be deprived of the voice of a significantsection of our population.That would make our democracy less representative and lessdemocratic. So, the makers of our Constitution thought of aspecial system of reserved constituencies for the weakersections. Some constituencies are reserved for people whobelong to the Scheduled Castes [SC] and Scheduled Tribes[ST]. 27. In a SC reserved constituency only someone who belongs tothe Scheduled Castes can stand for election. Similarly onlythose belonging to the Scheduled Tribes can contest anelection from a constituency reserved for ST.Currently, in the Lok Sabha, 84 seats are reserved for theScheduled Castes and 47 for the Scheduled Tribes (as on 1September 2012). This number is in proportion to their sharein the total population. Thus the reserved seats for SC and STdo not take away the legitimate share of any other socialgroup. 28. Voters listOnce the constituencies are decided, the next step is to decidewho can and who cannot vote. This decision cannot be left toanyone till the last day.In a democratic election, the list of those who are eligible tovote is prepared much before the election and given toeveryone . This list is officially called the Electoral Roll and iscommonly known as the Voters List. 29. This is an important stepfor it is linked to the firstcondition of a democraticelection: everyone should getan equal opportunity tochoose representatives. Wehave heard about theprinciple of universal adultfranchise. In practice itmeans that everyone shouldhave one vote and each voteshould have equal value. 30. No one should be denied the right to vote without a goodreason. Different citizens differ from one another in manyways: some are rich, some are poor; some are highly educated,some are not so educated or not educated at all; some are kind,others are not so kind.But all of them are human beings with their own needs andviews. That is why all of them deserve to have an equal say indecisions that affect them.In our country, all the citizens aged 18 years and above canvote in an election. 31. Nomination of candidates We noted above that in a democratic election people shouldhave a real choice. This happens only when there are almostno restrictions on anyone to contest an election. This iswhat our system provides. Anyone who can be a voter can also become a candidate inelections. The only difference is that in order to be acandidate the minimum age is 25 years, while it is only 18years for being a voter. 32. There are some other restrictions on criminals etc. but theseapply in very extreme cases. Political parties nominate theircandidates who get the party symbol and support. Partysnomination is often called party ticket. Every person who wishes to contest an election has to fill anomination form and give somemoney as security deposit. 33. Recently, a new system of declaration has been introduced ondirection from the Supreme Court. Every candidate has tomake a legal declaration, giving full details of :Serious criminal cases pending against the candidate; Details of the assets and liabilities of the candidate and hisor her family; and Education qualifications of the candidate. 34. Election Campaign The main purpose of election is togive people a chance to choose therepresentatives, the governmentand the policies they prefer.Therefore it is necessary to have afree and open discussion aboutwho is a better representative,which party will make a bettergovernment or what is a goodpolicy. This is what happensduring election campaigns. 35. In our country such campaigns take place for a two-weekperiod between the announcement of the final list ofcandidates and the date of polling. During this period thecandidates contact their voters, political leaders addresselection meetings and political parties mobilize theirsupporters. This is also the period when newspapers and television newsare full of election related stories and debates. But electioncampaign is not limited to these two weeks only. Politicalparties start preparing for elections months before theyactually take place. 36. In election campaigns, political parties try to focuspublic attention on some big issues. They want to attractthe public to that issue and get them to vote for theirparty on that basis. Let us look at some of the successfulslogans given by different political parties in variouselections. 37. The Congress party led by SoniaGandhi gave the slogan of Menahi ,Hum in the Lok Sabhaelections of 1971. The partypromised to reorient all thepolicies of the government toremove poverty from the country. 38. This was the slogan of BJP inthe Lok sabha elections 2014 39. In a democracy it is best to leave political parties andcandidates free to conduct their election campaigns the waythey want to. But it is sometimes necessary to regulatecampaigns to ensure that every political party and candidategets a fair and equal chance to compete. According to ourelection law, no party or candidate can:Bribe or threaten voters; Appeal to them in the name of caste or religion; Use government resources for election campaign; andSpend more than Rs. 25 lakh in a constituency for a LokSabha election or Rs. 10 lakh in a constituency in anAssembly election. 40. If they do so, their election can berejected by the court evenafter they have been declared elected. In addition to the laws,all the political parties in our country have agreed to a ModelCode of Conduct for election campaigns. According to this, noparty or candidate can: Use any place of worship for election propaganda;Use government vehicles, aircrafts and officials for elections;andOnce elections are announced, Ministers shall not layfoundation stones of any projects, take any big policydecisions or make any promises of providing public facilities. 41. Polling Votes: The final stage of an election is the day when the voters castor poll their vote. That day is usually called the election day.Every person whose name is on the voters list can go to anearby polling booth, situated usually in a local school or agovernment office. Once the voter goes inside the booth, the election officialsidentify her, put a mark on her finger and allow her to casther vote. 42. Counting Votes: A few days later, on a fixed date, all the EVMs from aconstituency are opened and the votes secured by eachcandidate are counted. The agents of all candidates arepresent there to ensure that the counting is done properly. The candidate who secures the highest number of votes from aconstituency is declared elected. In a general election, usuallythe counting of votes in all the constituencies takes place atthe same time, on the same day. 43. We get to read a lot about unfair practices in elections.Newspapers and television reports often refer to suchallegations. Most of these reports are about the following:Inclusion of false names and exclusion of genuine names inthe voters list;Misuse of government facilities and officials by the rulingparty;Excessive use of money by rich candidates and big parties;and Intimidation of voters and rigging on the polling day. 44. Many of these reports are correct.We feel unhappy when we read orsee such reports. But fortunatelythey are not on such a scale so asto defeat the very purpose ofelections. This becomes clear if weask a basic question: Can a partywin an election and come to powernot because it has popular supportbut through electoralmalpractices? This is a vitalquestion. Let us carefully examinevarious aspects of this question. 45. Independent Election Commission One simple way of checkingwhether elections are fair or not isto look at who conducts theelections. Are they independent ofthe government? Or can thegovernment or the ruling partyinfluence or pressurize them? Dothey have enough powers to beable to conduct free and fairelections? Do they actually usethese powers? 46. The answer to all these questions is quite positive for ourcountry. In our country elections are conducted by anindependent and very powerful Election Commission (EC). Itenjoys the same kind of independence that the judiciaryenjoys.The Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) is appointed by thePresident of India. But once appointed, the Chief ElectionCommissioner is not answerable to the President or thegovernment. Even if the ruling party or the government doesnot like what the Commission does, it is virtual impossible forit to remove the CEC. 47. Very few election commissions in the world have such wide-rangingpowers as the Election Commission of India. EC takes decisions on every aspect of conduct and control ofelections from the announcement of elections to the declaration ofresults.It implements the Code of Conduct and punishes any candidate orparty that violates it.During the election period, the EC can order the government tofollow some guidelines, to prevent use and misuse of governmentalpower to enhance its chances to win elections, or to transfer somegovernment officials. When on election duty, government officers work under thecontrol of the EC and not the government. 48. Popular participation Another way to check the qualityof the election process is to seewhether people participate in itwith enthusiasm. If the electionprocess is not free or fair, peoplewill not continue to participatein the exercise. Now, read thesecharts and draw someconclusions about participationin India: 49. 1 .Peoples participation in election is usually measured byvoter turnout figures. Turnout indicates the per cent ofeligible voters who actually cast their vote. Over the lastfifty years, the turnout I Europe and North America hasdeclined. In India the turnout has either remained stable oractually gone up.90807060504030201001 2 3 4 5 6Voters turnout in India andUK IndiaVoters turnout in India andUK UK 50. 2 .In India the poor, illiterate and underprivileged people votein larger proportion as compared to the rich and privilegedsections. This is in contrast to western democracies. Forexample in the United States of America, poor people, AfricanAmericans and Hispanics vote much less than the rich and thewhite people.3. Common people in India attach a lot of importance toelections. They feel that through elections the can bring pressureon political parties to adopt policies and programs to them .Theyalso feel that their vote matters in the way things are favourablerun in the country 51. The interest of voters in election related activities has beenincreasing over the years. During the 2004 elections, more thanone third voters took part in a campaign-related activities.More than half of the people identified themselves as beingclose to one or the other political party. One out of every sevenvoters is a member of a political party. 52. Acceptance of election outcome One final test of the free and fairness of election has in theoutcome itself .If elections are not free or fair, the outcomealways favors the powerful. In such a situation, the rulingparties do not lose elections. Usually, the losing party doesnot accept the outcome of a rigged election. The outcome of Indias elections speaks for itself: The ruling parties routinely lose elections in India both at thenational and state level. In fact in every two out of the threeelections held in the last fifteen years, the ruling party lost. 53. In the US, an incumbent or sitting elected representativerarely loses an election. In India about half of the sittingMPs or MLAs lose elections. Candidates who are known to have spent a lot of money onbuying votes and those with known criminal connectionsoften lose elections. Barring very few disputed elections, the electoral outcomesare usually accepted as peoples verdict by the defeatedparty. 54. Challenges to free and fair elections All this leads to a simple conclusion: elections in India arebasically free and fair. The party that wins an election andforms government does so because people have chosen it overits rivals. This may not be true for every constituency. A few candidates may win purely on the basis of moneypower and unfair means. But the overall verdict of a generalelection still reflects popular preference. There are very fewexceptions to this rule in the last fifty years in our country.This is what makes Indian elections democratic. 55. Yet the picture looks different if we ask deeper questions: Arepeoples preferences based on real knowledge ? Are the votersgetting a real choice? Is election really level playing field foreveryone? Can an ordinary citizen hope to win elections? Questions of this kind bring the many limitations and challengesof Indian elections to our attention. These include :Candidates and parties with a lot of money may not be sure oftheir victory but they do enjoy a big and unfair advantage oversmaller parties and independents. In some parts of the country, candidates with criminal connectionhave been able to push others out of the electoral race and to securea ticket from major parties.