Democracy for India

Democracy for India

After attaining independence, India decided to adopt the parliamentary system of democracy based on adult franchise. The democratic system was modeled on the systems prevailing in some of the European countries. Without taking into account the socio-cultural milieu of our country and without considering the political history of ancient India with its sound systems of governance, the Indian constitution was drafted and enacted. It was a constitution body in which the head was taken from the British constitution, the belly from the constitution of France and the legs from the constitution of Finland. How could such admixture be suitable as a constitution for a very ancient country inhabiting one seventh of the world population characterized by great cultural diversity ? It was a sure recipe for disaster.

The constitution of India has many defects when considered in the context of its suitability for a country like India with its pluralistic culture. There are many political thinkers and intellectuals who feel that the present type of democracy is still the most suitable form of polity for India. They do not realize that this democracy has comprehensively failed us. Multi-party democracy has bred political corruption of the gravest kind. In recent years, this has given us unstable governments, weak prime ministers and chief ministers and made politics a vile game of money power. Elected governments and lawmakers have all the powers to change the order of things. They can provide us the kind of utopia that our founding fathers had dreamt of. But in the present dispensation, it would be far fetched to expect that. If our citizens continue to lack nationalistic feelings, if our people continue to be self centered and individualistic, it would be imprudent to expect that democracy, in this present form, can solve the problems of the country. This democracy needs reforms so that it can be in tune with the nation’s cultural ethos. Look at the democracies of the Western countries. The USA and the UK have a two-party system of democracy which has always ensured stability of elected governments. The presidential system   of government in the USA has facilitated strong and quick decision making and smooth resolution of national issues. India also needs to switch over to a two party system of democracy. It would be still better if presidential system of government is brought in at the same time. This would give greatly improved governance. It should be remembered that in ancient India, small kingdoms were very efficiently governed by Kings who were free to choose their council of ministers. The rule of the King of ancient time bears considerable similarity to the presidential system of government in a partyless democracy.

Literacy level is another very important factor in the success of democracy. Democracy in USA, Canada, UK, Germany, France or Japan has been successful because of the high literacy level in their population. The defects of the India’s constitution have already been elaborated upon earlier. It is interesting to note that some of our seasoned politicians have been votaries of the Presidential system of government. L.K. Advani of the BJP had strongly favoured a thorough overhaul of the constitution to make it in tune with our present requirement and the socio-cultural characteristics of our nation. But, unfortunately, on whatever occasions this issue was raised in the Parliament, a majority of the MPs scuttled it. The idea of national government consisting of proportional representation of ministers from various political parties mooted by Vasant Sathe and also by Atal Behari Vajpayee was also not supported by a majority number of MPs. This proposal had a good solution to the problem of instability of elected governments and the burden of frequent general elections.

In general, it has been observed that any proposals to amend or modify the constitution so as to change the present system of democratic polity have not been favoured or encouraged by those in command of the nation’s destiny – clearly for continued  serving of their vested interests.

In most of the elections, whether at the central or state level, the voter turnout in India is less than 55% or 60%. The average turnout rarely exceeds 50%. Further, the party which wins a majority and forms  the government usually gets 30% to 45% of the cast votes. Now, a government which has the expressed vote of 35% of the voters has the actual expressed vote of only 17.4% of the total electorate. What type of representation is it ? A government which has the vote of only 17.5% of the electorate cannot be a government truly of the people, for the people and by the people. Things get still worse when the people also do not cast their votes objectively. They vote often on the basis of extraneous factors like caste or religion of the contesting candidates. Also, we should not forget that there are millions of illiterate or semi-literate electorate who do not have an objective understanding of electoral machinery or of the factors that should decide their franchise. This kind of democracy is close to a sham.

Hard proponents of democracy extend counter argument that democracy in India is yet not mature because India is still only 65 years old as reckoned from the year of independence. They make a comparison with the USA which attained independence as early as in 1783 and where democracy has evolved over a period of two and a half centuries. This kind of comparison is too simplistic if not absurd. This is primarily because the present world with its international political machinations is far different from the world of 18^th, 19^th and 20th centuries.

The Indian constitution provides for an Election Commission at the central and state levels to conduct, oversee and regulate elections. As per the rules framed by the Election Commission, the maximum permissible expenditure for canvassing in the elections of an MP is Rs. 40 lakhs. But generally, the money spent by a canditate contesting  the General Election is several crores. It is the duty of the Election Commission to disquality any candidate who exceeds this prescribed expenditure limit. Also Election Commission must call for Balance Sheets of political parties and perform a professional auditing of the same. Right under the nose of the Election Commission, candidates spend 10 or 20 times the allowed sum of the money on their election campaigns. Has a single candidate been ever disqualified by the Election Commission for exceeding the election expenditure limit ?

When all the institutions or instruments of democracy fail in their designated duties, when candidates and parties win in elections on the basis of negative voting or default, what is the purpose of continuing  with the existing democratic system for the country ? If our democracy has, even after sufficient number of trials, failed to provide clean administration and effective governance, why persist with it ?

While talking of democracy and its alternatives, reference must be made to the system of government prevailing in our neighbouring countries viz. Pakistan, Bangladesh and China.

In Pakistan, for four decades and more, military dictators were in the saddle of power but the quality of governance provided by military dictatorship has been abjectly poor, worse than that in India. Illiteracy, poverty and corruption exist to a greater degree in that country. A dictatorship can provide good governance only if it is committed, patriotic and independent i.e. free from external influences. That Pakistan has been a virtual stooge of USA is well known. In recent years, democratically elected governments too have given no better governance in that country for essentially the same reasons.

In Bangladesh too, the failure of democratic governments is ascribed to the above reasons given for Pakistan and largely interference by foreign powers in the country’s governance. Remember that in both Pakistan and Bangladesh, the society is not as pluralistic and heterogeneous as in India. Still, strong external factors as indicated above have ensured that these countries do not progress.

The case of China is most interesting and important. Sixty years ago, China was not better but below India in terms of various indices of economic growth and prosperity and of human development.  Exploding population and rampant poverty were the greatest challenges to the communist regime. The transition of China of the 1940s to its present stature as a leading economic and military power speaks volumes about the effectiveness of governments run by committed, patriotic rulers even in totalitarian regimes. China has very successfully controlled population growth. Its economy has been recording a consistent growth rate of 8-12% over the last thirty years. It succeeded in attracting huge foreign investment for its infrastructure and other industry even before becoming a member of the WTO. Today, it is a gigantic industrial power.

In very general terms, in a democratic dispensation, success of governance depends on three factors – transparency, accountability and justice. If the democratic system and the people running the system are such as to ensure transparency in the government’s operation, accountability in the functioning of ministers and bureaucrats and an efficient judicial system, governance shall be successful.

In today’s scenario, the greatest stumbling block to the development of third world countries is the political interference in their affairs by some first world countries. This vile game of political intrigues includes inciting one nation against the other for war by supply of arms and ammunitions, installing pliant  individuals as rulers who will play stooge to the superpowers, and using political leverage to fix unfavourable international trade terms for the developing countries. The above interference in the internal politics of developing countries significantly undermines the quality and effectiveness of governance there. India is no exception to this. If the present type of democracy is unsuitable for India, some external powers have indeed played a role in the continuation of this political system for India.

This article has talked of suggested reforms in our constitution for providing a democratic system which shall give good governance. What prevents our lawmakers from effecting those important amendments in the Constitution ? Absence of national character – indeed ! Where will national character come from ?

An organization like RSS which is branded as communal by left wing politicians and like minded people has been trying to build national character of Hindus through social gathering and indoctrination. Products of the RSS endeavour like LK Advani and AB Vajpayee have strongly favoured constitutional reforms on the above lines but they were never supported by their political colleagues of the opposition camps in this matter.

Today the educated urbanites in India appear to have become tired and sick of the extant political system. The average urbanite is heard saying that democracy is a failure in India and this country needs a strong dictator who will rule with an iron hand. However there are many who also say that no political system is good or bad – the people make it so and people get the government they deserve. The important fact that emerges out of these opinions is that the character of the citizens has the greatest role to play in the whole matter. If the people have a strong national character – whether it comes from their moral sense or gets shaped under strict and fair governance by rulers who are altruistic and patriotic, nothing can hamper their nation’s progress.