This time the Opposition insists that “democracy bachao!” is more than a jumla, that democracy’s opposite will become India’s reality if voters arm Narendra Modi and his National Democratic Alliance (NDA) with an unalloyed fresh mandate. Jolted by the arrest of Delhi’s chief minister (CM), Arvind Kejriwal, the INDIA bloc seems also to have found new vigour. Now there’s no hesitation when INDIA’s candidates or spokespersons charge that handing an electoral walkover to the NDA is the sole purpose behind the central agencies’ election-eve raids of the homes and offices of Opposition leaders, and behind the arrests of some of the bloc’s leaders.
Jharkhand’s former CM Hemant Soren was arrested on January 31 under a corruption allegation. At that time, the INDIA bloc refrained from speaking of a “walkover” that those who run India today allegedly desire in the voting that’s about to start. On March 31, the alliance underlined its new clarity by giving a central place on its Ramlila Ground dais to the wives of both the arrested chief ministers.
These arrests have also prompted international expressions of concern, including by officials in the United States and Germany. Our government’s scornful dismissal of such expressions as “interference” in India’s internal affairs might please ardent nationalists amongst us. But it is unlikely to allay global worries or the sadness of Indians who cherish democracy.
“BJP’s washing machine” is surely one phrase that will figure in future histories of Indian democracy. We know that present-day researchers have come up with a pair of findings. One, for every Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) politician that India’s enforcement agencies scrutinise for possible illegal acts, at least five or six or more Opposition politicians are investigated. Two, investigations against Opposition politicians tend to come to a halt the moment these politicians cross over to the BJP.
Not wanting a genuine election is only one of the Opposition’s charges under the democracy rubric. An intent to change the Constitution is another indictment. Those making this accusation offer a series of grounds. One is Narendra Modi’s central role, enacted by him in his capacity as the country’s Prime Minister, in the inauguration of Ayodhya’s grand Ram Mandir. Another is the earlier ceremony when, with the visible blessing of Hindu priests, he formally installed in the Lok Sabha chamber a Hindu symbol of governance — a gold-plated sceptre, fashioned after an ancient Chola design.
A superior status in the Indian State for one faith or its adherents is not possible without an inferior place for other faiths and their followers, which today’s India seems to hail. Doesn’t it appear today that the average policeman, newspaper, TV channel, or any other holder of influence has been fitted with special eyes? Even a bulldozer seems able to separate a Muslim encroacher from his Hindu counterpart.
Toni Morrison, the African-American writer who won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1993 and died in 2019, put it this way: “If you can only be tall because someone else is on their knees, then you have a serious problem.” In India, that serious problem is also a constitutional problem and one that corrodes our democracy.
Money power in politics crossing a limit may be seen as the third big hit taken by Indian democracy. Although cash as the path to power has been discussed since 1952 (when India’s first Lok Sabha elections were held), the question received an unprecedented spotlight on February 15 of this year, when our Supreme Court (SC) ruled that the electoral bonds authorised by the Modi government and sold by the State Bank of India are unconstitutional. Their secrecy was the bonds’ worst feature, declared the SC.
We can mark that while India’s people did not know who was financing politicians, the government could always find out (from SBI, which kept a record) the names of all those who had purchased the zero-interest, tax-free bonds and given them to the political party (or parties) of their choice, which then exchanged the bonds for cash. This authority over information gave the government immense power over all bond buyers, even as bond donors purchased influence with political parties.
SBI’s procrastination in supplying the list (demanded by the SC) of the bond buyers and the parties enriched by them (among which the BJP was evidently the first by a wide margin) has told its own story. It does not prettify the image of Indian democracy.
As the Opposition sees it, and as independent watchers too might conclude, a fourth major weakness in Indian democracy’s current state is the apparent concentration of power in a handful of individuals, plus the unlimited, unceasing projection of a single individual as the source of all wisdom. Ambedkar warned us in 1949 that while bhakti in religion might be a road to salvation, bhakti in politics is injurious to democracy. I’m paraphrasing. The actual remark was stronger.
Rajmohan Gandhi’s last book was India After 1947: Reflections & Recollections. The views expressed are personal
State of democracy is the Opposition’s battle cry
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09.04.2024
This time the Opposition insists that “democracy bachao!” is more than a jumla, that democracy’s opposite will become India’s reality if voters arm Narendra Modi and his National Democratic Alliance (NDA) with an unalloyed fresh mandate. Jolted by the arrest of Delhi’s chief minister (CM), Arvind Kejriwal, the INDIA bloc seems also to have found new vigour. Now there’s no hesitation when INDIA’s candidates or spokespersons charge that handing an electoral walkover to the NDA is the sole purpose behind the central agencies’ election-eve raids of the homes and offices of Opposition leaders, and behind the arrests of some of the bloc’s leaders.
Jharkhand’s former CM Hemant Soren was arrested on January 31 under a corruption allegation. At that time, the INDIA bloc refrained from speaking of a “walkover” that those who run India today allegedly desire in the voting that’s about to start. On March 31, the alliance underlined its new clarity by giving a central place on its Ramlila Ground dais to the wives of both the arrested chief ministers.
These arrests have also prompted international expressions of concern, including by officials in the United States and Germany. Our government’s scornful dismissal of such expressions as........
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