The Hindu Business Line : A vote for the ‘selectorate’

Better governance will emerge when the entire cost of contesting is borne by the state, if the number of contestants is reduced by some form of pre-selection and when every order of the state is accompanied by an indication of who is responsible for the order, says P.V. INDIRESAN.

Political corruption starts with our election system.

Oops! I made a mistake the last time. When I heard about the 49(0) regulation, I cross-checked with the Central Election Commission but somehow the talk drifted away and I forgot to check whether it was true that when the number of “none of the candidates suitable” exceeded the difference between the top two candidates, the election is declared void. Sorry to say it will not be. Only when the numbers exceed the highest votes polled by a candidate one may expect the Election Commission to take notice. As that is most unlikely, the rule is only a form of mild protest, nothing more. Sorry!

I mentioned the 49(0) rule because I had planned to write about political corruption in the present article. The revulsion Mumbai people showed against politicians in the November terrorist attack was more because they were supposed to be corrupt than because they were incompetent.

In turn, political corruption starts with our election system which has become so expensive that one has to be exceedingly rich to meet the cost. Further, most of the cost goes to bribe voters and cannot be disclosed. The result — most candidates have become dependent on unaccounted money, dependent on criminals.

Our elections still depend on vote banks of the very poor and of slum dwellers. For that reason, politicians are not inclined to cut down poverty nor remove slums. Although we have done fairly well, the present government has placed its priority on survival; its interest in governance is secondary.

That is the reason why India ranks low in the Transparency Index, in Competitiveness Index as well as in the UNDP’s Human Development Index. The country is not particularly secure — a third of India’s districts is fettered by Naxalites. In terms of poverty — at the current rate of $1.25 per day — nearly 70 per cent of India’s population is poor. In many parts of India, social development — literacy and healthcare — is worse than in Sub-Saharan Africa.

What is the remedy? The remedy lies in more responsible and more responsive MPs and MLAs. We will not get more responsible nor more responsive legislators so long as they are tied to black money. Hence, the remedy lies in making elections so inexpensive that any ordinary person can contest and win without recourse to black money.

Less candidates, less expense

Honestly, elections are expensive because communicating with the electorate is expensive. The government is unwilling to fund elections because we have nearly a thousand political parties and many more independents.

If the number of candidates is small, say four or five, the government may be able to afford to pay the cost of communications. Hence, the remedy lies in reducing the number of candidates — at any rate the numbers that are eligible to get government support.

Then, the problem reduces to identifying, short-listing eligible candidates. That requires a minimum two-part selection: At the first stage, shortlist a few eligible candidates and then, at the second stage, let the eligible candidates face the electorate. The problem is how to shortlist? In the US, they have the system of primary elections. They have the luxury of having only two major parties, a virtue our politics does not possess. In any case, primary elections are as expensive as the final ones and hence will not do.

We need a cheaper and reasonably effective system of short-listing. Fortunately, the conditions for short-listing are different from the ones for finding the ultimate winner. In short-listing, the concern is to ensure that that no good one is left out even if a few bad ones slip through.

For final selection, the concern is the opposite: No bad ones should slip through even if a few good ones lose. Hence, we need not ask every one; a selected few should suffice.

How to select?

Then, how do we select the “selected few”? That could be the tax payers, or graduates or even a few voting booths. We may then ask each candidate to make his or her presentation to the “selectorate” and all those who get, say, 5-10 per cent of the votes may be funded by the state. It is most unlikely that a person who cannot get even 5-10 per cent of the selectorate will win in the final election. Hence, this system will let through anyone with a remote chance of winning; it will also cost very little.

What should we do if no one gets 5-10 per cent of the selectorate, which is a definite possibility when the number of aspirants is very large?

That is definitely possible when the state offers to meet the entire cost of contesting an election. In order to limit the number, we may raise the security deposit to a few lakhs of rupees, large enough to limit the contestants to really serious candidates.

Once such candidates are selected, they may be given a chance to debate among themselves at least once a month and the debate broadcast on TV.

As the election approaches, the debates could become more frequent. The cost of such debates and of the TV presentation may be borne by the state. Further, administrators should also be free to act — like the Election Commission — to prevent politicians from getting things done anyway they like. The Right-to-Information Act is a step in the right direction but it is not good enough. It must be replaced by a Responsibility-to-Inform Act, particularly to inform who is responsible for any decision taken by the government.

NO Accountability

At the present time, it has become the practice among many ministers not to indicate their wish on paper but to do so orally — often through their Personal Assistants. For fear of transfers, bad Confidential Reports and the like, administrators are generally compelled to act the way the Minister desires.

Therefore, ministers exercise power without accountability. Once the state is forced to indicate in every order who is the responsible official for the order, administrators will be forced to seek formal approval from the minister rather than accept whatever the personal assistants say. That will constrain politicians to act responsibly, which they do not have to do at the present time.

Then, it is my contention that better governance will emerge when the entire cost of contesting is borne by the state, if the number of contestants is reduced by some form of pre-selection and when every order by the state is accompanied by an indication who is responsible for the order. Unfortunately, these reforms remove the power of the high commands to nominate each and every candidate and letting administrators do whatever they like — without responsibility.

In particular, in the US and the UK and in all mature democratic countries, there is no high command with the kind of powers that our parties have. Remove that power, the power of a small coterie to own political parties as if they were their private property, and the quality of our politicians will improve several fold.

Unfortunately, only political parties can implement these reforms. Now that there is a revulsion against politicians, now is the best time to start a movement for these reforms, which may not remove all ills, but will definitely reduce them to a manageable number.

(Concluded)

(The author is a former Director, IIT Madras. blfeedback@thehindu.co.in)

(This is 241st in the Vision 2020 series. The last article was published on December 8.)

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