NEW DELHI—Nearly a billion Indians are going to the polls to vote for the country’s 18th parliament. Polling for 543 seats in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of India’s parliament, takes place in seven phases from April 19 to June 1. A new ruling party will be declared on June 4. This interplay of electoral democracy, the largest event of its kind in human history, given India’s huge voting population, also marks a time of reflection for democracy watchers and thought leaders—those who attempt to remain unstirred by the intense battle of emotions generally provoked by elections in India.
They are analyzing election campaigns, watching political behaviors, tracking public opinion and maintaining a playlist of both loud and discreet messages blaring from election grounds, while thinking about where and how India’s institutional growth is possible. Any exhaustive analysis of such a vast demography is difficult, as the community of analysts discusses how a rising India will continue to overcome the challenges that confront its democracy, while continuing to evolve its goals.
In India’s parliamentary system, the members of the upper house, the Rayja Sabha, are chosen by members of state legislative assemblies. The members of the larger and more powerful Lok Sabha, or lower house, are chosen by universal adult suffrage.
Thus Lok Sabha elections assume great importance. The party that wins a majority in the Lok Sabha forms a government: its leader becomes prime minister and it appoints various ministerial positions. In the event that a party does not win a clear majority, a coalition of parties may be called to form a government.
Analysts in India and abroad who spoke with The Epoch Times are of the opinion that India needs a strong government at its helm, and say this would come through a party that gets a majority of seats in parliament. The greater the majority, the stronger the government.
However, they say that developing a culture of strong opposition will be vital, as India debates constitutional amendments, its global footprint, volatile borders and other policy reforms that will impact its internal stability and global rise. A healthy opposition will provide competitive policy depth, an orientation towards action, and leadership options that engage in constructive debates on the direction of the country and its future.
Chandra Mishra, who has worked as a political strategist for five state governments and six chief ministers, told The Epoch Times that he feels the weakness of the opposition gives rise to an “ego of power,” irrespective of the party. In other words, in Indian politics there has long been a culture where the ability to stir the country’s progress is considered synonymous with largely controlling its vast resources. It is primarily believed to be the government’s role, and thus that role is itself coveted as power.
“Never expect the ruling party to strengthen the opposition or ... vice versa. It’s your duty to connect to the people through your policies, actions, messages etc. The leadership should be deep rooted and connected with the aspiration of the people. Symbolism would no longer work,” said Mr. Mishra. The Indian public, he feels, is no longer influenced merely by the lure of big promises, but judges political parties and leaders based on what they implement on the ground.
Two other states are ruled by the Aaam Aadmi Party (AAP), whose leader, Arvind Kejriwal, is currently in jail on a graft case. One state, Kerala, is ruled by a communist alliance. The other four states are ruled by regional parties.
Mr. Mishra is of the opinion that Mr. Kejriwal’s arrest has made him a hero. Behind the timing of his arrest, he said, is the BJP’s strategy to overshadow the current leadership of the INC—thereby further weakening the opposition coalition.
“In 2014 and 2019, the BJP was aided in its quest to attain a single-party majority in Parliament by a fragmented opposition. In many constituencies, the BJP was facing off against not a unified opposition but several opposition parties competing with one another as much as they were battling the BJP,” wrote Mr. Vaishnav.
“The inevitable result was a fracturing of the opposition vote,” he said.
Power, Structure, Pre-Polls
Kaush Arha is the President of the Free and Open Indo-Pacific Forum. He is a senior fellow at the Institute for Tech Diplomacy at Purdue and at the Atlantic Council. Speaking with The Epoch Times in a phone conversation, Mr. Arha said that a democracy’s resilience lies in its structural strength.“At its core can the populace hold those in power accountable? Free elections and free press are the foundation of democratic accountability. India boasts the world’s most vibrant elections and local press with a penchant for investigative journalism,” he said.
“Those who cherish democracy need to cherish the will of the people in fair elections. You cannot be for democracy and hold voters in disdain if their preferences differ.”
Mr. Vaishnav said that in the last elections, in 2019, the BJP earned 45 percent of the country’s votes, suggesting that more than half of the country didn’t support the party.
“While their common anti-BJP position creates a floor for the opposition, the INDIA coalition must also offer an alternative vision for governing that sufficiently distinguishes it from the BJP,” he said.
Mr. Mishra said narratives around strong leaders being autocratic have been prevalent in the case of every “strongest leader” who has swept elections in India’s history. There was a time in Indian history when the leader of INC, Indira Gandhi—India’s only female prime minister to date—who held office for three different terms, was termed a dictator, he noted.
“Everybody knows that there was a slogan: ‘Indira is India and India is Indira.’ But despite of that we have to admit that Indira Gandhi created a vote bank and the whole nation—cutting across language, cutting across culture, cutting across boundaries—voted for her. And now the same happens for Modi,” said Mr. Mishra.
However, with strong ruling leaders like Mr. Modi, it becomes even more imperative to have stronger leaders in the opposition to maintain a balance in democracy, he stressed.
“From [an] American perspective, it’s not for us to pick sides between Modi’s India or Congress’s India, as long as it’s a strong India. It is a fact that India has gotten stronger over the last decade,” he said.
Debating the Threat to Democracy
While the campaign for the 2024 elections has been in full swing, one loud narrative blaring through most of the opposition campaigns has painted the BJP as a threat to Indian democracy. The BJP, on the other hand has picked up an ambitious poll slogan, “Ab ki baar 400 paar,” meaning “this time we'll cross 400 seats in the parliament.” Those 400 seats would mean an absolute majority. Critics and opponents worry that if the BJP comes to power with an absolute majority, it will use its power to change India’s constitution.Sunita Aron, the author of three books on Indian politics and currently a consulting editor with the Hindustan Times, told The Epoch Times she feels that talk about changes in the constitution has more to do with fear than anything else.
“So far everybody’s talking about two [or] three things, which can happen in a country like India. One, they are talking about [how] this is going to be the last election, and second is that the constitution will be amended, depriving Muslims of their political, social rights and all these things. But when these things are discussed during [the] election, it’s more like ... propaganda generating fears in certain sections,” she said.
There are concerns that if the BJP wins an absolute majority, it will change the fabric of the country and distort the secular fabric of the Indian society, but Ms. Aron feels this is easier said than done.
“Okay, you have numbers in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha but the public power is huge,” she said. She added that amendments to the constitution are always possible, noting that there have already been numerous amendments made by the Indian Parliament to the original 395 articles of the constitution.
“And when the opposition is also talking about changes to the constitution, they are not saying what changes are they [the BJP] talking about,” said Ms. Aron, while concluding that regardless of who comes to power, she is “very confident” that the fundamentals of the Indian constitution can’t be changed.
Amending the constitution is not sacrilegious in itself, as long as it done the right way, Mr. Arha said, citing the U.S. Constitution, which “is better for its amendments.” He added, “In functional democracy fear mongering can be as corrosive as actual intimidation.”
“They have gone through such a big exercise that we shouldn’t have elections around the year. Every year you have some or the other election in this [massive] country. The government is involved in some or the other election every year, more than being focused on the performance of what they do,” said Ms. Aron.
