Perilous Path of Electoral Democracy

Bhaskar Majumder

All the people eligible byannounced minimum age with no upper age limit were and are happy because they got the chance to cast votes or vote their castes once every five years. This is what innocent people understood as their political power–‘one man–one vote–one value’. Thus, equality was perceived at the political space by the innocent people or the voters.

Little did one try to understand that in inter-generational fixed-targeted exclusion of a large chunk of people by castes and market, political inclusion by right to vote would be either guided by the power lobby or forced on the economically excluded or adversely included?

Little did one realise the relevance of education in the processes of voting and electing the appropriate candidates. The overall rate of literacy as the first approximation of access to formal education was 18.33 percent in 1951 that took 70 years to reach 77.70 percent in 2021. Percentage of Graduates and above in 2011 in India was 4.5. The implicit assumption is the existence of a strong positive correlation between formal or institutional education of the individual and electoral outcome. Of the voters on the electoral roll that political parties take care to include and Election Commission of India takes care to provide Voter’s Identity Card, the educated established middle section generally abstains from casting votes that requires standing on long queue for the purpose. The number of abstaining eligible voters is much more than this middle section for different reasons including migration. The abstained voters are not identical over each five-year electoral gap by time planning; however, the self-excluded eligible voters come from the same education-bracket.

Since most of the voters in practice come from the bottom layer of the society by caste-community as well by economic indicators, they are guided or are determined pre-casting of votes by the political determinants for several reasons apart from the general fact that this bottom section is historically determined or is a consequence of the processes under command of the political determinant.

If the cause-consequence mechanism is rigidly historically fixed, one may opine that the same political party will continue to rule. This continuation fails sometimes like post-Nehru political era at all-India level, or post-Bidhan Roy era in West Bengal or post-Left Front rule in West Bengal. This is for several reasons that seem not possible here to explain in detail. I shall mention a few with West Bengal as a case.

The same set of voters who were guided to vote in favour of Left candidates since late 1970s started voting in favour of the ruling Trinamool Congress in Bengal since more than a decade ago with two five-year election-plannings completed; some of the local or middle-level leaders also changed side in the electoral game. One point is economic existence–political power provides space for economic existence. The voters at the bottom are also the economic actors like vendors, rickshaw pullers, domestic assistants, tiny businessmen who remain unprotected unless the political authority takes them under its umbrella. The middle-level less-educated leaders changed sides for they needed similar role as in the past or more by being labour contractors, real estate dealers, and stability in business. The political authority at the highest level knows the cost-benefits of all these calculi.

Left came to occupy political space through electoral processes post-Congress Rule under Dr Bidhan Roy because of natural and artificial crises manifested in food crises of mid-1960s, emergence of radicalism in politics, youth unrest and all that. Already refugee influx from East Pakistan post-Partition of 1947 as a prize for India’s independence created ‘Roji-Roti’ crises. Notwithstanding import of food grains by the Government of India from the United States under Public Law (PL) 480 for distribution through Fair Price Shops and in parallel spatial success in Green Revolution because of import of High-Yielding Variety (HYV) of seeds from Mexico, the food-need of the large population failed to be fulfilled. Politics captured the economic space.

India is a land of personal charisma. During the initial political election years like 1952, 1957 during the uninterrupted ‘Planning Era’ (1951-1966) the educated middle section had tremendous faith in Nehru at the Centre and Dr Bidhan Roy in West Bengal. Both left the physical world by the mid-1960s, which apparently created a political vacuum reflected in political turmoil and turbulence during 1966-1972, leading to lumpenisation during the early 1970s in West Bengal and, for some different reasons, the declaration of ‘Internal Emergency’ imposed by the Government of India in June 1975. This is not to be elaborated here other than noting only that personal charisma has its limit in long-term governance. The same was with the rule by the Left Front under the leadership of Mr Jyoti Basu. Had the political base been strong, how could it crumble down post-Nehru or post-Roy, or post-Basu? Personal charisma may explain political outcomes, but it cannot sustain the outcome.

This is where the autocrats or political determinants collude to make the political outcome the same and stable like ‘U rule there, I rule here’. One may call it political ‘collusive duopoly’. This is different from ‘double engine’ government, at the Centre and at the state on the circumference, where it is the ‘same I’. In a political collusive duopoly, the political parties are different, but they have a common enemy who is to be obstructed from entering into the political electoral market. Political manifestos or agendas are different, but the enemy is common–it is not poverty or miseducation or an unscientific outlook–it is rationalists.

Changing rulers at the Centre or the states is seen as a problem less venomous than the uprising of the youth termed by the rulers in the mainstream as ‘radicals, urban Naxals, militants, deshdrohi’ and all that. Innocent people are made to believe this ‘state vocabulary’ and people become the voters based on the already established assumption that ‘thinkers are anti-state’. The rule by the mediocre perpetuates mediocrity–be it fascists or autocrats or camouflaged ‘bondhusarkar’ (friendly government). Treachery works more than truth–people are innocent.

What surprises this writer is the century-long glorifiable history of Bengal Renaissance, and on that pedestal, the questionable current political outcome? This raises a further question: is politics outside the circumference of culture? Culture I definitely includes education, language in the public domain, body language, reciprocal socio-cultural relations and not ‘social distancing’ by caste-community-gender. In case political outcome is economically determined, it is comprehensible like ‘Lakshir Bhander’ in West Bengal, seen as a guarantee of votes cast by women. This is a simplistic explanation if people at the bottom are determined is true. The Bhander seems an economic guarantee for the survival of households where the kitchen is run by women, even with questionable gender division of labour–even with women seen as equal partners in ‘beyond home’ job market, formal or informal. The middle class in West Bengal learnt to think that the Bhander obstructed the Left from coming back to power through electoral politics after what they perceive as misrule by the current ruling power. It cannot be tested, however, what happens if Bhander withers away?

It is a bigger question whether the political rulers are electorally determined or economically determined. The role of money monopoly comes here. In the circle of gossip, money plays a role in guiding the voters, the extent of which is probably not estimated so far. There may be exceptions. The system is indecomposable for the invisible hand of the ‘core state’ also promotes ‘monopoly capital’ that provides the pedestal for the ‘power to be’. It seems, ‘all economic answers are political questions’ needs a complementary proposition, that is, ‘all political answers are economic questions’. India’s electoral democracy is in a whirlpool.

[The author is Prof. (Retd.), G.B.Pant Social Science Institute, Allahabad]

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Vol 57, No. 41, Apr 6 - 12, 2025