The Hindu Business Line : Our democracy

Candidates are voted to State Assemblies or the Lok Sabha with the primary objective of representing the interests of those who voted for them in the elections. They are not supposed to be pieces of dumb furniture merely occupying a seat in the House but are meant to play an active role in injecting a dose of reality into the proceedings of these august assemblies so as to frame useful legislation.

Does this mean that political parties which, in the first place, select the candidates for election by the electorate should choose people who are equipped to play a “useful” role in the House concerned apart from just pressing the button on motions placed before them? On the face of it, the answer ought to be yes because, very simply put, every legislator should be in a position to provide able leadership to the specific section of the electorate which has sent him or her to the House, the inference being that, taken together, the legislative body concerned should comprise a body of leaders who are the best available at any given point in time to provide leadership to a State or the nation as a whole.

Idea of the fairer sex

Clearly, the onus is on the political parties involved in the electoral fray to make the best possible choice of candidates because it is only after this selection process that the candidates find themselves in a position to campaign for votes. It is like a plate full of food items, leaving the eating of them to the partaker of the meal, who has no choice apart from what has been served to him. Thus, if, after prolonged campaigning, there still isn’t enough women members either in the Lok Sabha or in the State Assemblies, it is the political parties comprising the membership of the Houses which should be pulled up for the lapse. The reason is simple: If a larger number of women candidates are named for safe seats, at the end of the elections there will be a larger number of women among those elected. The curious thing is that while all political parties habitually sing the praises of the idea of having a larger number of the fairer sex in legislative Assemblies than is the case now, hardly any of them have developed internal “systems” which by now could have easily translated the proposal into stark reality.

Why have the political parties gone slow on this front? Alternatively, why have they not been able to make faster progress in this direction? The answer is slightly more complex than it would seem at first glance if the profile of, say, the membership of the Lok Sabha over the decades is considered. Statistics collated by responsible bodies indicate that, proportionately, the number of history-sheeters in the Lok Sabha has increased, one inference being that the political parties which backed these people did so not considering it worthwhile to promote instead, say, the cause of women candidates.

The ‘written word’

Certainly, the written word of the statute regarding the candicacy of a certain class of people has not been violated. But, then, isn’t the “written word” the distilled essence of the “spirit” which forms the very basis of the Indian Constitution? Is it right to keep within the confines of what is “written” even if in doing so one militates against the very spirit which forms the core of the legislation concerned?

Indeed, it can be argued generally from this premise that political parties which initially select the candidates for the elections are chiefly to blame for not conforming to the spirit of our Constitution. Eligibility for the polls in our parliamentary democratic system should not be confined to the “hold” a prospective candidate may have on a section of the people for diverse reasons, including virtuosity on the stage or the screen. It should be defined by the “leadership qualities” the person concerned possesses, a test which should be conducted by none other than the political parties at the stage of candidate-selection, to the exclusion of all other considerations.

RANABIR RAY CHOUDHURY