Stemming the rot

A retired bank employee in his eighties, a regular reader of my articles in Tamil and English on democracy, called me over the phone and asked for an appointment to talk. He is literally immobile and can only communicate with me over the phone. Hence, I asked him to contact me after 9 o'clock at night. Exactly at nine, he called and asked me to clarify the linkage between the theory and practice of democracy in India. He raised this question due to my continuous writing on the functioning of democracy in India against the backdrop of its basic principles of democracy. I used to quote Harold Laski’s ‘Grammar of Politics,’ Mill’s ‘Liberty,’ John Stuart Mill's ‘Representative Government,’ and Edmund Burke’s 'Speeches in Parliament' while explaining parliamentary practices worldwide, particularly in India.

He argued with me that the politics practiced by our politicians today is not democratic. Neither do our politicians practice the Western model of representative democracy in a true sense, nor do they follow the Indian model of democracy. Of course, they are unaware of the type of democracy practiced in ancient India, known as Dharmocracy. Neither do our politicians read BR Ambedkar nor Gandhi's framework of democracy. What our politicians are doing today in our country is a total insult to democratic values.

After hearing his argument, I asked him, "What do I have to do in this context?" Without taking a second, he replied, "People like you not only write and speak but also act firmly without taking sides as a public intellectual." He furthered his request, asking me to assemble a collegium of a hundred public intellectuals in this country to speak in one voice, raising the consciousness of the people.

"In a true democracy, people have to act as citizens with a responsibility to raise their voices on societal issues. In reality, in India, citizens have been oriented to be beneficiaries of the government, and as a result, they never raise their voices but only noise as beneficiaries. Currently, the public's consciousness level is very low, for which our politicians are responsible for bringing democratic values and practices to their lowest ebb. Now, a new consciousness is needed, and that consciousness cannot be created by the present set of politicians as they are on the warpath to capture power. To serve the people, they compete with each other in an aggressive manner, emitting venom in their utterances and actions.

"It is unequivocal from our past experiences that political parties are interested in power politics, keen on capturing power and position through which they can do whatever they want, not for the welfare of the people, and they also do not rely on people to capture power. They rely on market forces and can purchase people with money given by the market. It's almost a contract with people to take the government for five years by paying them money while getting votes. At this juncture, no political party can save the democracy we have seen in the past. Some politicians and parties came to the limelight based on the issue of attacking corruption, but after becoming a political party and capturing power, they also indulge in corruption at different levels as they also require money to face elections. Hence, one cannot expect a new political party to address this issue. It needs not a new party but new politics."

He did not stop with the above argument. He moved further and argued that "of all the basic elements of democracy in our country, only one value, that is the conduct of elections, is in vogue and that too is practiced with serious flaws. Once the election is over, the party or parties that won the election, declared by the Election Commission, are allowed to assume office without resistance. This itself is a very big success for our democracy. Beyond that, our democracy is stunted. Hence, the need of the hour is to clean our party system itself so that public intellectuals, at least, practice truth and work in unison to reform our party politics through the conscientisation of people. It should be done only by people like you. Beyond writing articles and working through social media, you have to organise a public intellectual forum."

I asked him a question, "Do you have any roadmap for the activities of the public intellectuals?" He replied promptly. "A few days ago, you participated in a webinar and made a presentation on how to reform our party system. You should take steps to make that a strong political discourse in this country. In that session, you proposed a few immediate activities to regulate and reform our political parties. First, the political parties have to be brought under the ambit of our constitution. Second, the recognised national and regional parties' elections have to be conducted by the Election Commission of India and not by themselves. Third, the expenditure and income of the political parties have to be audited by the Auditor General of India, and thereby they can be well-regulated. There is yet another proposal of bringing separate legislation to regulate the parties, as the Companies Act has to be initiated. Furthermore, to reform the parties, no one has to continue in office of the parties for more than two terms. It is very essential to democratise the political parties. The political parties want democracy to get power, not to democratise the society. Hence, they function with a feudal mindset.

Apart from the above, the cost of elections has to be reduced. Most of the expenditure has to be borne by the Election Commission, for which the Election Fund has to be created through CSR and Election officers. Besides strict adherence to election rules pertinent to election, the expenses of the parties and elections have to be regulated. These are the proposals you have mentioned in your speech. Hence, it is necessary to take steps to make it a public discourse.

Well-meaning public intellectuals have to join together to initiate a new discourse in a louder voice to reform the party system in India."

Now an idea has been mooted to support the initiatives of the Association of Democratic Reform to further its activities with much vigour.

The writer is a former Professor and Rajiv Gandhi Chair for Panchayati Raj Studies, Gandhigram Rural Institute. Views expressed are personal