Narendra Modi set cat among pigeons by pitching simultaneous elections, but its time has come

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has set the proverbial cat among pigeons by calling for a debate on simultaneous Lok Sabha and Assembly elections. The idea, which has since been echoed by the president during the Joint Session of Parliament and some Union ministers, is not new. In fact, many political parties and pundits reflexively dismissing the notion as “unconstitutional” and “anti-democratic” would do well to remember that simultaneous polls were held in India for two decades since Independence. [caption id=“attachment_4311943” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  File image of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. PTI[/caption] During the heydays of Congress as the single-largest political party with a dominant national footprint, concurrent polls were held in 1951-52, 1957, 1962 and 1967. Premature dissolution of Legislative Assemblies disrupted the practice after which separate elections were held for national and sub-national legislatures. The practice discontinued, but the idea lived on. In 1983, Election Commission of India suggested a return to the practice of holding concurrent polls. As Liz Mathew pointed out in The Indian Express, the the Election Commission’s suggestion was resurrected by the Justice BP Jeevan Reddy-headed Law Commission, which in May 1999 (via its 170th report), stated that “we must go back to the situation where the elections to Lok Sabha and all the Legislative Assemblies are held at once”. Modi was also staying consistent with BJP’s consistent effort to mainstream the idea. Leaders such as Lal Krishna Advani and Atal Bihari Vajpayee floated it in the past. Vajpayee had, in fact “succeeded in getting the UPA to refer it to the Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice” even after his loss in 2003, as Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay reminded us in The Economic Times. Big steps towards formalisation of the idea were taken in recent years when the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice in its report came out in favour in 2015, followed by the Niti Aayog study conducted by Bibek Debroy and Kishore Desai in 2016. A year later, the Election Commission claimed that it is logistically equipped to stage concurrent polls in 2018. Former Union minister P Chidambaram has a sharp memory, so he must have been betting on a short public memory when he termed holding of concurrent polls as “yet another election jumla”. The senior Congress leader doubtlessly remembers that Pranab Mukherjee, his long-time party colleague, in his capacity as president, strongly argued in favour of simultaneous polls during the Joint Session of Parliament last year. “With some election or the other throughout the year, normal activities of the government come to a standstill because of code of conduct. This is an idea the political leadership should think of… the Election Commission can also put in their idea and efforts on holding the polls together and that will be highly beneficial…” He held that “frequent elections put on hold development programmes, disrupt normal public life, and impact essential services and burden human resource with prolonged periods of election duty”. Though implementation of the idea is still a remote possibility, incumbent as it is on a variety of factors including political consensus and a Constitutional amendment, there’s no denying that the idea has gained traction. On cue, the idea has generated a heated debate among backers, critics and the Opposition. The proposal demands a dispassionate discussion of merits and demerits instead of alarmism or political rhetoric. Voter participation increases Study of voter behaviour in India shows that voter motivation has decreased in accord with holding of separate Lok Sabha and Assembly elections. In the participatory nature of Indian democracy, this is undesirable. While power has become more decentralised with the advent of regional parties, it has also meant that fewer and fewer voters are turning up to cast their ballots. Conversely, it proves that concurrent polls would increase voter participation. Quoting Concordia University professor Csaba Nikolenyi’s paper on Indian election (based on Riker-Ordeshook model) Sai Manish wrote in Business Standard that “while the number of registered voters has increased four times since 1967 (when simultaneous polls were held for the last time), the Election Commission managed to enhance voter turnout by around 5 percent. This means that of almost 600 million additional voters added over the years, just about 30 million have turned up to cast their vote: Abysmal by standards of certain democracies like the UK and Canada.” Northeastern states have recorded a much higher (17-21 percent) turnout when concurrent polls have been held, argues the article. It is therefore fallacious to claim that simultaneous polls will result in subversion of democracy. Cuts pressure on exchequer, streamlines resources Both Niti Aayog and the Parliamentary Standing Committee have gone into detail over how frequent elections are putting huge amount of pressure on the exchequer. The cost factor is important in a resource-stretched country like India where the state and the federal governments are locked in a relentless battle to balance fiscal prudence with redistributive schemes aimed at uplifting the most vulnerable section of the populace. For instance, the spending for 2014 general elections almost rivalled that of the US presidential polls. As The Economic Times pointed out in a report shortly before the expenditure was made public, “The projected expenditure to elect the 16th Lok Sabha is set to rival the $7 billion (approximately Rs 42,000 crore) spent by candidates and parties in the 2012 US presidential elections”. Holding elections also involves indirect costs involving logistics, arrangement of personnel and deployment of security forces. The huge manpower required to hold frequent polls are usually diverted from other sectors (such as educational institutions) that have an adversarial impact. Simultaneous polls will make it easier for streamlining of these resources. No blackmail by pressure groups Frequent elections create a situation where any caste, community or interest group may hold the administration to ransom by way of organised protest. In such a situation, the checks and balances fail to function, governance suffers and democracy gets subverted. The latest iteration of this formula was noticed during the Padmavaat protests when Karni Sena goons, who claimed to represent the Rajput community, went on a rampage in different parts of the country and the entire political class (both ruling and the Opposition) were either silent or sided with the goons to pander to community sentiments. As this writer recently argued : “In absence of the political compulsion of pandering to every pressure group before the next upcoming election, the government may no longer be afflicted with paralysis in confronting a threat to law and order and the Opposition may rediscover its political will in holding the government accountable in case it falters.” Less time in ‘campaign mode’ One of the biggest insecurities that led Opposition to vociferously protest against the idea is Modi’s prowess as a campaigner. The prime minister is energetic, relentless and a consummate orator who knows how to mould public sentiment. The Opposition fears that a presidential style election will minimise their chances by amplifying the ‘Modi effect’ and hand BJP a decisive advantage. Multiple elections in a year will force Modi to be on a permanent campaign mode, and BJP’s ace weapon will likely suffer a burnout. Let’s flip this argument. Elections are not only about BJP and Modi. Conversely, this also means that not just the prime minister, but the entire political class is forever locked in an ‘election mode’ which allows little time for policy-making, administrative or developmental work. Add to this the Model Code of Conduct, and the recipe for policy and administrative paralysis is clear. As Kanishka Singh wrote in The Indian Express, “Due to elections each year, key leaders holding posts in government are tied up for months in campaigning across the country leaving the functioning of their government to the hands of the bureaucracy.” No subsuming of sub-national causes The argument that simultaneous elections will favour ‘big parties’ and go against regional chieftains, is specious. Aam Aadmi Party’s overwhelming success in Delhi came in February 2015, just a few months after BJP’s momentous victory in Lok Sabha polls. If regional parties have a relevant agenda and a strong leader, they can serve to actually counterbalance the dominant national force during simultaneous elections. The Opposition’s irrational fears are rooted more in overstating of the ‘Modi factor’ in polls. To argue that voter will become influenced by ‘wave’ is to actually admit defeat even before an election is fought. There is some amount of overlap that goes on in terms of accountability, as R Jagannathan argued in Swarajyamag: “The argument that says voters can get confused when all elections are held simultaneously is valid, but the remedy for it could be constitutional amendments that provide clarity on the division of law-making powers. The concurrent list is pointless… Once this is done, the voter will have no confusion on what to demand from whom, even if elections are held on the same day for three levels of government.” Strongest argument against the idea The strongest argument against simultaneous polls remains the premature dissolution of state Assemblies before the five-year term. It militates against the cardinal principle of democracy: Rule of majority. Both Niti Aayog and parliamentary panel have advised workarounds in terms of two-phase elections or devising a ‘confidence’ motion along with ‘no-confidence’ motions to allow for the president to elect a representative in select cases. These, however, need a more thorough and constructive discussion. Little can be achieved through alarmism to stop an idea whose time has come.