Is One Nation, One Election A Ploy?

What India needs more than one simultaneous election is better governance both at the central and state level.

Yes, we need reforms, but our priority should be to make elections less expensive, make it more democratic, do away with freebies which are actually bribes before elections, allow only those who are educated to contest, and bring in a bill to make it impossible for criminals to contest, asserts Ramesh Menon.

The Narendra Modi government is toying around with the idea of introducing a bill in Parliament soon to have simultaneous elections to the Lok Sabha and state assemblies.

Is it because the trend in recent elections has shown that the voter votes for the BJP coalition in the national elections, but chooses a regional power in the state assembly? The moot question is whether the voter will differentiate between both in a simultaneous election...

Home Minister Amit A Shah has said the BJP-led coalition government plans to roll it out in the current tenure.

The BJP has wanted to do it since its landslide win in 2014.

It is a complicated affair and a contentious one, too. It will require about 15 Constitutional amendments.

The Opposition is not taking kindly to the idea.

The Lok Sabha is where the voter decides who should helm the country's affairs, and the state assembly is where the voter chooses a party that understands local and regional issues and would ideally resolve them.

Both elections in India are, therefore, not the same. We have seen numerous times how voters vote differently in both polls.

For instance, Delhi voters backed the Aam Aadmi Party in the state assembly while they voted for the BJP in all the seven Lok Sabha seats in the capital.

The Constitution wanted a federal form of government, as the visionaries who sculpted it, found it to be democratic.

If the one nation, one election plan has to come through, it needs the nod of both the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha.

The states will have be consulted and cajoled as there will be 17 state governments that will have to be disbanded before their term ends.

How many will agree to such an eventuality in a power-hungry political culture?

And how fair would it be for voters to evaluate the truncated terms of their state governments?

The Modi government had appointed a committee under former President Ram Nath Kovind to present a report on the One Nation, One Election idea.

But it was not to go into studying if it was the right thing to do but to just prepare a roadmap for it to happen.

It just had a garb of looking at electoral reform. Nothing of the kind.

That Kovind agreed to do it after holding the highest office in the land was surprising. All its eight members appointed by the Modi government were unanimous in their recommendation that it should be implemented.

Opposition leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury remarked that its terms of reference guaranteed the conclusion it would reach.

One central argument being forwarded is that it will cut down the humungous costs that elections today have to bear. Also, it would save resources.

It was estimated that the last Lok Sabha elections in 2024 cost around Rs 135,000 crore. The 2019 general elections cost around Rs 60,000 crore.

Another rationale that is a good argument is that there is policy paralysis all the time in India, as both the central and the state governments in power are constantly engaged in one election or the other, wasting a lot of time that could be used to ensure good governance and policy making.

This is true as soon after the election results in Maharashtra were announced, BJP ministers got busy strategising for the upcoming Delhi elections.

The desperation is evident as even elections for a couple of seats in a minor by-election has all political parties devoting their time to it ignoring other priorities for which the voter voted.

The Kovind Committee observed that frequent elections created uncertainty, so simultaneous elections would ensure stability and predictability in governance. It will also help reduce costs, it argued.

The Committee said that in the 2029 election for the Lok Sabha, all state assemblies and local bodies could be dissolved as a one-time measure, while local body elections could be held within 100 days.

An election due to a hung legislature could be held mid-way but only have a shorter term to synchronise with the following nationwide election, it said.

The Committee said it had discussions with stakeholders before submitting the report, and of the 47 political parties that had submitted their views, 32 supported the idea.

The Congress, AAP, TMC, DMK, CPM, SP, BSP and CPI were among those who opposed it.

Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal says that with synchronised elections, local agendas and concerns of various states would be neutralised by aggressive national party campaigns that can impact the federal structure.

It is a fact that around half a dozen state elections happen every year. So, the ruling government and the Opposition are constantly spinning in an election campaign mode. Almost all the ministers get busy campaigning all around the year.

The lust for power is overpowering for politicians.

So, when are they busy with governance? Is this what we want in a democracy?

One cannot guarantee they will be involved in carving policy if elections are held only once in five years. But that is being touted as an argument to have simultaneous elections.

The administration is also overworked, handling numerous elections to Parliament, state assemblies and local bodies in cities and rural areas.

What India needs more than one simultaneous election is better governance both at the central and state level.

Yes, we need reforms, but our priority should be to make elections less expensive, make it more democratic, do away with freebies which are actually bribes before elections, allow only those who are educated to contest, and bring in a bill to make it impossible for criminals to contest.

Ramesh Menon, award-winning journalist, educator, documentary film-maker and corporate trainer, is the author of Modi Demystified: The Making Of A Prime Minister.

Feature Presentation: Aslam Hunani/Rediff.com