Rashtrapati, Rashtrapita

This major political reform will have several beneficial effects on our democracy. Firstly, it will broadbase the presidential election, by adding nearly three million more electors to the existing electoral college of 4,896 MPs and MLAs. There being no whip in this election, this will reduce the scope of politics of manipulation, inducements and blackmail that the Congress party routinely resorts to. Look how, by misusing the CBI stick, it’s got both the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party in UP to back its candidate. Secondly, this will encourage members of PRIs and ULBs to outgrow their localism and develop a national perspective. Thirdly, the President too will feel Constitutionally obliged to speak up for the legitimate needs and rights of these long-neglected grassroots institutions of democracy. Fourthly, this will compel political parties to start taking them more seriously. Lastly, giving PRIs and ULBs a right to vote in the presidential election will also force the centre and state governments to take them seriously. Today, even two decades after the 73rd and 74th Constitutional amendments, neither the centre nor the state governments have taken all the necessary steps to decentralise powers to the PRIs and ULBs in terms of funds, functions and functionaries. India’s inclusive development without effective decentralisation of powers is a pipedream.

The strongest reason for broadbasing the electoral college for the Rashtrapati election is that this is in keeping with the thinking of India’s Rashtrapita (Father of the Nation). Mahatma Gandhi, who had envisioned Gram Swaraj or the Republic of India as a natural and national collective of largely self-governing and mutually cooperating village-town republics, had prophetically cautioned: “The larger a democracy grows, the less it becomes the rule of the people and the smaller is the say of individuals and localised groups in dealing with their own destinies.” He has been proved right by India’s highly centralised structure of (mis)governance.

Read the full article:  Sudheendra Kulkarni : Sun Jun 24 2012, 03:23 hrs