The primary argument for mooting such an
idea is that it will cut down on the cost of elections in terms of both time
and money. The advocates of simultaneous polls argue that frequent elections
impede development and welfare as governments are periodically subject to code
of conduct for elections and political parties remain perpetually in election
mood.
Society needs to be united to overcome
the challenges of development. But, lack of political consensus often proves to
be detrimental to development. Politics divides the people rather than uniting
them. Elections further divide the people at every level. Frequent elections
further create divisions in society, thus adversely affecting the developmental
consensus.
Political populism is dampening the
economic development. In a bid to lure voters, political parties resort to
promising many populist measures thus channelising away the resources from
long-term development. Frequent elections further compound these constraints on
development. Thus, the idea of simultaneous elections is mooted as an antidote
to the political instability and perpetual politics induced by multiple
elections.
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Undemocratic
Idea
The
proposal for simultaneous elections is undemocratic because the political
scenario of a diverse country is unsuitable for simultaneous elections. In a
multi-party political system, electoral issues and the mandate differ from
state to state and from the states to the nation. The diverse political
spectrum offers a range of choices for the electorate. Simultaneous elections
would be a serious disadvantage for the regional parties as the national mood
will dominate the election scene, thus giving undue political advantage to
national parties.
The
argument in defence of such a proposal is that simultaneous elections would
save money, time and resources. If this is accepted, one can also demand that
elections should be held once in 20 years as it would save more time and money.
Against
Federalism
The
proposal to hold simultaneous polls is unconstitutional as it goes against
federal principles. Federalism forms part of the basic structure of the Indian
Constitution and, therefore, even Parliament has no power to amend it. Holding
elections to the Lok Sabha and state assemblies simultaneously tramples upon
the rights of the states. This tantamounts to coercive federalism, not
cooperative federalism. The state legislatures in India do not owe their
existence to Parliament. Instead, both the state and the national legislatures
draw their powers and functions from the Constitution of India.
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Constitutional
Void
In
an age of fragmented polity and fractured verdicts, with each state having
distinctive electoral arithmetic and political chemistry, which again is
different from that of the Centre, any attempt to club these will create a
constitutional void. If any state elections fail to throw up a clear mandate
making government formation impossible, should we wait for the full term of the
Parliament to lapse to conduct Assembly elections in such a state? Similarly,
if all the states witness a clear mandate and the verdict is fractured in Lok
Sabha elections due to which no government is formed, should all the state
Assemblies be dissolved to facilitate simultaneous elections? Thus, such an
idea is simply impractical.
Impractical
Proposal
It
is nearly impossible to implement, as it would mean arbitrarily curtailing or
extending the term of existing legislatures to bring their election dates in
line with the due date for the rest of the country. Even if it is done for one
time to facilitate simultaneous polls, it cannot be done always. Such
intervention is nothing but subversion of people's mandate which is for a
particular period of time.
While
expressing lack of confidence in one government, members of the legislature
will have to repose trust in an alternative. It also suggests that premature
dissolution of the House could be avoided if all members sit together and elect
a leader. But, such reforms can also be implemented even without simultaneous
polls. However, such regulatory provisions would undermine parliamentary scheme
and deprive the opposition of right to move no confidence motion.
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Distributing
Power Constitution envisages different layers of governance. The 73rd and the
74th constitutional amendments created a third layer of government in the form
of local self-government. This was precisely aimed at distributing political
power at different levels and among different players to avoid
authoritarianism. Therefore, simultaneous polls militate against the
constitutional vision and strengthen despotic tendencies. The constitutional
checks and balances will be endangered.
Making
Parties
Accountable
Frequent
elections need not be a bad idea, as political parties would have to be
eternally accountable. Otherwise, there is every danger that the elected
representatives would be away from people for five years.
Whither Cost?
As
Praveen Chakravarty wrote in The Hindu, the Election Commission incurs a total
cost of roughly Rs 8,000 crore to conduct all state and federal elections in a
span of five years, or roughly Rs 1,600 crore every year. Nearly 600 million
Indians vote in India’s elections, which means that it costs Rs 27 per voter
per year to keep India an electoral democracy. To put this in context, all the
States and the Centre combined incur an annual expenditure of much over Rs 30
lakh crore. Surely, 0.05% of India’s total annual expenditure is not a large
price to pay for the pride of being the world’s largest and most vibrant
electoral democracy.
Alternative
Proposals
Earlier,
the NITI Aayog suggested synchronised, two-phase Lok Sabha and assembly polls
from 2024 to ensure minimum disruption to the government's development works.
The Law Commission recommended for categorising States based on proximity to
the next general election, and for having one round of State Assembly polls
with the next Lok Sabha election, and another round for the remaining States 30
months later. This would mean that India would have a set of elections every
two-and-a-half years. But, even this would entail arbitrary synchronisation of
elections to legislative bodies that goes contrary to the principles of
representative democracy.
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The
Way Out
Better
solutions exist for the problems which are cited to justify simultaneous polls.
These include electoral reforms like state funding of elections and modifying
the election code of conduct. Further, reforms should be made in the political
party system through which parties do not excessively depend on the prime
minister, chief ministers and ministers for election campaigning.
Suitable
measures can be devised to cut short the period of electoral process. For
instance, now, elections are held in several phases due to lack of adequate
paramilitary forces to provide security for the polls. The strength of the same
can be augmented to hold the elections in a day or two. The period of the
election campaign can also be reduced. Certainly, there are problems with
frequent elections. But, the cure cannot be worse than the disease.
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