Take It EC

Almost immediately after the unexpectedly good showing by the BJP in the Assembly Electionsin Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chattisgarh in December 2003, it was evident that the party would pitch forearly General Elections, and both the constituents of the ruling alliance and the opposition went into‘election mode’ and informal ‘campaigning’ commenced. The Election Commission (EC) immediately beganmaking recalcitrant noises, indicating that an election was ‘not possible’ before April 2004. After somedithering on specifics, Parliament was eventually dissolved on January 6, 2004. The Election Commission tookanother three weeks to announce the dates for a four-phase election that would take all of three weeks toaccomplish.

With this announcement, the ‘model code of conduct’ comes into operation, and all butthe most routine activities of governance are virtually suspended. This election would, moreover, see partiesengaged in an (official and unofficial) election campaign for over four months at a cost that is difficult toassess, and through a combination of methods that would, under normal circumstances, fall afoul, if not of theletter, then certainly of the spirit, of the code of conduct.

Indeed, the dispersal of the actual election dates itself – April 20 to May 10, withcounting on May 13 – constitutes an implicit problem, giving parties a chance to judge the mood of thevoters through exit polls in the earlier phases, and the opportunity to influence voters and coalitionstrategies in later rounds.

Even before Parliament was dissolved, the EC had voiced reservations regarding thepossibility of holding elections before April on the grounds that the revision of electoral rolls wasincomplete, and would only be accomplished in March 2004, since these were being updated with effect fromJanuary 1, 2004, as the qualifying date. This has become a recurrent plea before almost every recent electionand is a complete distortion of the process of revision of electoral rolls. This is not an exercise that isundertaken periodically, like a census operation, but is meant to be continuous.

The EC is, in fact, required to be ready to hold elections at all times, and pleas ofunpreparedness reflect nothing short of inefficiency and a palpable failure to fulfil Constitutionalobligations. Worse, despite all the ‘revisions’, the electoral lists remain, not only incomplete, butgrossly inaccurate. Press reports over the past months show, for instance, that many of New Delhi’sconstituencies had thousands of cases of bogus voters on the electoral rolls. Persons long dead are regularlyfound to survive on the lists of voters; a significant number of entirely fictitious individuals also enjoythe right to participate in the nation’s democratic processes. On the other hand, during the last Assemblyelections in Gujarat, thousands of voters in Ahmedabad found their names missing from the rolls, and wereconsequently prevented from casting their votes.

Traditionally, since 1951, the entire election process has taken an average of five toeight weeks. Over time, simultaneous nationwide elections have given way to phased polls, with the interregnumbetween phases progressively extended. In the meanwhile, successive Chief Election Commissioners have securedstar status in the media by making impulsive, ill-considered and entirely unwarranted statements of purelysubjective opinions regarding the conduct and character of political parties and leaders, as well as on arange of subjects relating to governance and their personal conceptions of morality. They have also intervenedin areas well beyond their Constitutional jurisdiction to impose norms – some of which may well bedesirable, though this is not always the case – or air prescriptions that are well beyond the EC’smandate, and that lie essentially within the sphere of legislation.

What we appear to be witnessing, then, is another case of the rampaging arrogance anddeclining competence of bureaucrats elevated to Constitutional office. There has been a continuous trend inIndia as a result of which, once an institution or office is placed under Constitutional protection, itsefficiency levels are rapidly eroded, even as its officials display a ‘jurisdiction hunger’ and adesperation for publicity and public adulation – much of which is easily and eagerly provided bycontemporary mass media – that goes against the purpose, character and dignity of the offices they hold. Itis, of course, common to rail against the corruption of politicians and the bureaucracy in general.

But it is useful to note that there are many forms of corruption, and that bribe taking isnot its only – or necessarily its most destructive – manifestation. The grandstanding, the gratuitouspontification, the lack of circumspection, the sweeping character assassination of the political and governingclasses, the hankering for publicity, that have characterized the pronouncements of several officials inConstitutional positions, including Chief Election Commissioners (CECs), is also a form of moral turpitudethat has enormous and detrimental impact on the political life of a nation.

It is useful, within this context, to recall that one CEC saw fit to describe allbureaucrats as "prostitutes" (he did not clarify whether they cease to be prostitutes afterelevation to Constitutional office). Another called all politicians "a cancer" for which there was"no cure". The present incumbent has used his position to air opinions that he confesses are"personal" and "not legally binding", but this has not deterred him from expressing thesefrom an official platform.

It is evident that these individuals acquire extraordinarily exalted opinions aboutthemselves; regrettably, an ill informed and pliant media has accepted and projected, indeed, magnified theirpretensions a thousand-fold, raising mediocre bureaucrats to the level of folk heroes for jobs that are, atbest, being poorly done. The impact of television, and the proliferation of TV news channels, has had aparticularly unfortunate effect in this context, with few officials displaying the necessary rectitude orstrength of character to resist the seduction of a proffered microphone on camera.

The ‘job’ of the EC is, of course, both gigantic and critical to the politics and,indeed, the very survival of Indian democracy. The Indian elections are the largest electoral exercise in theworld, and the present election will spread across over 77,000 polling stations, with more than a millionelectronic voting machines (EVMs) deployed over the length and breadth of the land. The deployment of securityforces across this vast and often-troubled canvas creates some of the greatest challenges for those who arestrategizing the election process.

While the numbers relating to elections and associated problems have risen continuously, itis also the case that better technologies, communications, roads and transport facilities, as well as the newEVMs, have also helped streamline the processes, significantly offsetting many of the adverse factors.Nevertheless, given the magnitude of the challenge, it would be best if the EC focused exclusively on meetingit with the desired levels of efficiency, rather than expending its attention and energies, and those of itssenior-most officials, on extraneous issues, on pontificating and grandstanding, and on making a publicspectacle of a Constitutional office.

K. P. S. Gill is Publisher, SAIR; President, Institute for Conflict Management Coutesy,the South Asia Intelligence Review of the South Asia Terrorism Portal . This piece wasoriginally published in The Pioneer, March 6, 2004) under the title "Curbs needed onEC's polemics".