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In the just constituted 15^th Lok Sabha, there were nearly 71.40 crore electors. The Congress got 11.91 crore votes which is 16.68 per cent of the total electors. i.e. the party got support of one out of every six electors. But in terms of seat share, it bagged nearly two-and-a-half times more at 37.93 per cent (206 out of 543 seats). Can it be termed “people’s will” when hiatus between vote-share and seat-share is so high?

Again, there are 145 MPs who won by a support of less than 20 per cent of electors—three of them getting less than or barely 10 per cent. (In the 14^th Lok Sabha, there were 95 MPs with less than 20 per cent votes). The question is: Does the House of the People, called Lok Sabha in our country, really reflect “people’s will” determined through the doctrine of majority rule?

Four fundamentals on which any democracy thrives are: Majority rule; recognition of minority rights; constitutional government; and governance by discussion. In India, the very first fundamental -- majority rule -- has remained flawed since Independence, more so in recent times.

Again, it leads to another question: In India, is it possible to carry out psephological predictions in the name of pre- or post-poll (exit poll) surveys in view of multi-variable situation obtaining in a country like India? There are, as per Election Commission records, 964 registered (but not recognized) parties in the country. Besides there are 50 recognized parties (seven are national parties and 43 state parties). Nearly 300 registered parties seriously contest in general elections and impact the turn-out. Not to say that each of these parties acts as variable impinging on the end result.

Besides, a major fallacy lies with our existing voting system known as first-past-the-post (FPTP) system (winner takes it all)? The Lok Sabha fails to reflect “people’s will” on account of  the faulty FPTP and many other complex factors. 

Four fundamentals on which any democracy thrives are: Majority rule; recognition of minority rights; constitutional government; and governance by discussion. In India, the very first fundamental -- majority rule -- has remained flawed since Independence, more so in recent times.

What is more disquieting is that, since 1990s, in most of the elections a party does obtain greater vote-share but less seats because of the faulty FPTP and on account of multi-variable election scenario.

Greater vote-share, less seats

Second reason why most of the poll predictions remain wrong is multitude of mutually contradictory variables (like if candidate of caste X is thrown up by party Y, certain voters may vote in favor of a party or a candidate whereas certain others voters may go away in reaction). Other reasons are: diversity, social stratification, abjectly high poverty, dismally low education and, above all, lack of political education.

In the recently concluded general elections, a leader of a so-called secular political party of a State made frantic calls to a TV channel head in the last phase of the elections. What surprised the channel chief was a bizarre request by this leader. “Since morning, your channel has been showing visuals of long queues of Muslim women in Burqa (black veil) at the polling station”. In what could be termed as an obvious reaction, the chief extended his greetings saying “Good, it means you are going to perform well in the State, my congratulations. Do you want that this footage is run till polling ends?” The jittery voice of the leader responded “ No, no, I request you to please stop running this visual  immediately”. Confused by this request, the TV channel chief asked him in bewilderment “Why, I believe Muslim voters support your party only?” “Yes”, howled the leader saying “this message is damaging us….. in reaction Hindus are drawing to the polling booths in unprecedented number to favor the opposite party”.

Well there can be no formula under the realm of  psephological knowledge to ascertain the magnitude of this kind of sudden reaction from one or the other mutually competing social segment.

Although psephologists have tried to evolve some formula like Cube Law and some methods of giving weightage to some known variables, these derivations can lead to correct results only in a bi-polar or two-party arrangement and not when multi-party and multi-polar situation prevails as is in India today. Besides, semi or illiterate majority voters, who are perpetually scared of powers-that-be, never speak their mind when quizzed by researchers.

Another factor that restricts the poll prediction is the lack of political education of voters on real issues that concern them. I will revert to it a little later.

As in India we have adopted the “First-Past-the- Post” (FPTP) system of election, a person getting just 11 per cent of the total votes can also claim one seat whereas a person returned with 90 per cent votes also wins one seat.

In the erstwhile princely era, it was a taboo to say “the King is wrong”. Today it is a taboo to say “the people are ignorant”. Unfortunately, this thumb rule that forbids analysts to say “the people are ignorant” has done more harm than good to the health of democracy in countries like India. Wailing in the trough of ignorance, hundreds of millions of Indian voters do not know what is good for them. A deadly mix of perpetual poverty and sustained ignorance is sure solvent of democracy. 

Thus, overnight, film stars are found at the hustings attracting crowd albeit for an altogether different reason. Thus for the past 11 years, every 25 minutes a farmer commits suicide but it does not evoke serious agitation and does not become an election issue. Thus growing rich-poor divide (at ginni-coefficient) fails to register in the minds of those who go to cast their votes.

Noted American writer, Mencken said “democracy is a pathetic belief in collective wisdom of individual ignorance”. The result of 2009 general elections is a clear indication of this ignorance but analysts shriek from the rooftop and see several messages that, according to them, the mandate throws up.

It pays the political class to ensure that that people are less awakened and are little aware of the issues that affect their lives.

Political thinkers such as Jeremy Bentham, Alexis de Tacqueville, John Stuart Mill and James Bryce insisted that in the last resort, it is the public opinion that makes democracy work. Enlightened public opinion, according to them, was the fulcrum of a thriving democracy. The two institutions that were assigned the job of making people enlightened are political class and the media. Ironically, both have abdicated this responsibility or have lost the credibility that is required to carry out this task.

 

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De-politicization of Indian Society

In the past one decade, there has been a subtle move to de-politicize Indian society. Media organizations which were responsible for creating public opinion have replaced news with trivia. The net upshot of this change in trend was that the role of the media in opinion building started diminishing. Suddenly, we find TV channels more into entertainment—in most of the cases vulgar entertainment. Like an opium dose that transports the consumer into different world away from present concerns, the entertainment programmes in televisions have made people completely de-politicized and unconcerned with what is happening around them.  

Thus, overnight, film stars are found at the hustings attracting crowd albeit for an altogether different reason. Thus for the past 11 years, every 25 minutes a farmer commits suicide but it does not evoke serious agitation and does not become an election issue. Thus growing rich-poor divide (at ginni-coefficient) fails to register in the minds of those who go to cast their votes. Thus CAG report clearly charging the Government officials of Orissa of looting NREGA (rural employment scheme) funds in the names of the dead (in most-poverty stricken Kandhamal) does not become an issue but an attack on a Sadhu or on a Church Father does. It pays the political class to ensure that that people are less awakened and are little aware of the issues that affect their lives.

This precisely is the reason why political parties had an apprehension that if dates of IPL cricket matches clashed with polling dates, there will be abysmally poor turn-out.

Fallacy of FPTP

As in India we have adopted the “First-Past-the- Post” (FPTP) system (one who touches the post takes it all) of election, a person getting just 11 per cent of the total votes can also claim one seat whereas a person returned with 90 per cent votes also wins one seat.

The sum total of the total votes polled in favour of two national political formations—the Congress and the BJP—has rather gone down suggesting that voters still prefer regional formations.

Unabashed by losing credibility on `forecast front’, the political analysts tried their hand in post-result ‘message’ of the voter. Now, if one wants to analyze the message of a mandate, one will have to delve into the hiatus between vote share and seat-share. I will show it below. The Congress vote share has hardly increased if we take into consideration certain hitherto unknown facts. In comparison to 2004 elections, the party got just 2.03 percentage point more vote share (26.53 per cent in 2004 to 28.56. per cent of the total votes polled in 2009). But this increase is because while the party had fielded only 417 candidates in 2004, this time it fielded 440 candidates—an increase of five per cent. So, the corresponding increase in vote share is not there. In fact, it has registered a drop over the previous elections. Again, in 1989 the Congress got 39.53 per cent and bagged 197 seats. But, in 1991, there was a three per cent drop in vote share although the number of seats the Congress won went up to 232 and Narasimha Rao formed the Government. Again, the BJP vote-share had never been more than that of the Congress but even after getting three to five per cent less votes it could form Government in 1998 and 1999 by winning over 180 seats. Thanks to a faulty FPTP system and opportunistic coalition.

Second, contrary to the political analysts’ claim that people have voted for Congress because of their penchant for stability, the fact is just the other way round. There is no sign of a return to national parties holding sway, for if we look at the support of the two largest parties, the Congress and the BJP, they contested 92 more seats in comparison to 2004 elections (873 versus 781) and yet saw their share of all-India votes fall by 1.3 percentage points. Barring some reverses for political outfits of Lalu Yadav, Mulayam Singh, Paswan and BSP who are the practitioners of identity politics, in all other parts of the country there is hardly any erosion in support base of regional parties. The sum total of the total votes polled in favour of two national political formations—the Congress and the BJP—has rather gone down suggesting that the space once created by two national formations is fast and incrementally shifting towards the regional formations.

Third, some of the regional parties like the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the Janata Dal  (Secular) certainly saw their support dwindle, but the large  increase in voting for others like the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) makes any generalization about the future of regional parties too simplistic to stand scrutiny.

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[The writer is a well-known political analyst and commentator. (e mail ID: singh.nk@etv.co.in)  ]