Bonds, big money and an imperfect democracy Premium

The electoral bonds scheme only highlights the growing weakness of Indian democracy

The electoral bonds scheme that has been declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of India, was supposed to end the financing of elections with black money. If this had happened, Indian politics would have been transformed with great benefit to the nation. After all, illegal finance results in the control of politics passing into its hands — and that subverts democracy. The electoral bonds made not an iota of difference to the way politics is conducted in India. Elections continue to be fought with an increasingly larger amount of illegal funds being spent by political parties and candidates.

The lesson is clear. If politics is undemocratic in content, no patchwork such as electoral bonds can make it democratic. Indian politics requires large sums of money since it has been largely hollowed out of its content and become formalistic. Elected leaders, mainly serving the interests of those who finance their elections, hardly represent the interests of their constituency. Vested interests, increasingly, have got themselves elected. What they profess and what they practice are different.

This gap between the professed and the actual undermines democracy since government is no longer an entity ‘of the people, by the people and for the people’. The vast majority of people see that they hardly gain benefit from government policies while vested interests corner most of the gains from development. It is in the design of the policies — the packaging is cleverly done to make policies appear to be in the national interest. In fact, vested interests are defined as national interest. They take precedence over the interests of the marginalised sections.

For instance, if poverty, unemployment, ill health and poor educational standards persist, these are said to be natural and are left to market forces. Concessions are granted to businesses to provide these services through the market which results in the inability of the poor to afford them while simultaneously leading to growing disparities. Concessions also reduce the availability of resources with the public sector so that it is unable to provide these services at the requisite level. Inadequate public services hurt the interests of the marginalised sections. For instance, the recent Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) shows that 40% of children in the age group of 14 to 18 years are unable to read, write or do the level of math of standard two. They cannot acquire higher skills which could enable them to end their poverty. So, why does education not receive high priority? That is because in the top down model of development, resources are preempted by the elite.

Businesses, not satisfied with the gains that they make legally, resort to making them illegally using undeclared incomes which constitute the black economy. Illegality is systematic and systemic. But, that is only possible if policymaker and executive become party to the subversion of the systems. This is the triad that underlies black income generation.

It requires weak accountability by government personnel, which is at the root of the weakness of democracy in India and its hollowing out. This is reinforced by the broadly feudal mindset that is prevalent in society which leads to the individual’s willingness to bow before authority rather than standing up to it. This is visible in the institutions that are supposed to uphold democracy.

Voting is often not based on a candidate’s performance but on attributes such as caste, community and region. To win votes, political parties slice and dice the electorate along these lines. Vote banks are cultivated and the constituents bribed just prior to an election. Campaigning is conducted by paid workers and crowds are mobilised to attend rallies and meetings using money, transportation and food. Big rallies are held to overwhelm voters, for which posters and cutouts are required, musclemen hired and the media kept happy.