Your vote, our vote

The world’s largest democracy now plunges into what would be unique even by Indian standards. Something like 675 million would be entit...

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The world’s largest democracy now plunges into what would be unique even by Indian standards. Something like 675 million would be entitled to elect the 14th Lok Sabha and 14 million will participate in simultaneously held assembly polls in seven states. But it is not just the improbable numbers involved that make India’s democracy so unique, it is the passion and spectacle it unleashes — and never more so than in a general election. There are the chronic doomsdayers who have long pronounced the death of Indian democracy. Certainly, negatives like the criminalisation of politics and the involvement of power brokers in this gigantic struggle for power have done their damage, but it would be shortsighted in the extreme to pronounce the end of politics in this country.

Historically, the average Indian had always relied on the king to rule wisely for the good and happiness of the people. This concept drew its strength from the social contract in ancient India where the raja’s dharma was defined in terms of his duty to ensure the well being of his/her people, failing which the ruler lost the moral right to rule. Modern democracy provides a simpler mechanism to allow people to make alternate choices if the rulers of the day have failed. But it has taken a few decades for ordinary voters to reduce their near-total reliance on the ruler to do his/her duty. The historical and cultural belief of tatha raja, tatha praja has progressively given way to the modern democratic idea that rests on the concept of tatha praja, tatha raja, thereby reversing the earlier belief. Instead of the people being guided by the ruler, it is the ruler that must now be guided by the people. It is their needs and their hopes that must be sought to be fulfilled.

This makes it incumbent upon candidates aspiring to power to reflect on what the people are really looking for. There are broadly two sets of people in the praja that would now elect the new “rajas”. One lot has benefitted from economic and social reform, the other has been untouched by it. The system suffers from severe asymmetries and structural infirmities which require responsive governance. The average Indian is a patient person; history has taught him/her to be so. But the times are a-changing and development itself is releasing new energies which would find ways to assert themselves. A general election is one such way. The people are looking for a break, a better quality of life. This makes it incumbent on those aspiring to be leaders to first discover the aspirations of the voter.