The EC claims that it is ready for ‘one nation, one poll’ once the laws are amended, & the Govt’s agenda is clear
The debate on “one nation, one poll” has been an ongoing one and looks like the Narendra Modi Government is pursuing it despite concerns. Soon after the Prime Minister expressed his own commitment to work towards simultaneous polls, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sunil Arora has said that once the legal considerations and amendments were taken care of, the Election Commission (EC) could set the process in motion as it was in the “ready” mode. On the face of it, the favourable aspects would seem attractive, chief among them being the streamlining of costs and apparatus of conducting the election process itself and stemming the prospect of policy paralysis, with some State or the other due for a mandate every other year. The argument is that with States in India’s federal structure going to polls at varied points of time within the Central Government’s mandated period of governance, no visionary or decisive steps can be taken or implemented as they would be subservient to electoral politics which, in this country, tends to be overtly populist in nature. Besides, it would rid the country from being in a continuous poll mode and go in for a performance mode. But it is in the subtext of the Westminster system which we have adopted, that questions arise about whether a unitary system works best for our federal structure. And in the current political context, whether it threatens the very idea of regionalism itself, considering that in a single election, national issues tend to take the centre stage and drown out or at least blur pertinent issues of localised interest, something that regional parties are usually in better command of and base their political relevance and bargaining chips on.
Although many argue that the voter is evolved enough to make a distinction between the larger national interest and those of his periphery, there is always a possibility that the overarching aura of the former could affect the judgment call of the voter at the State level if the prevailing party seeking mandate happens to be of a centrist party. And as the results of the last Lok Sabha elections have shown, the centrist surge has helped the ruling BJP regain its footprint in States where it had been hit badly in the last Assembly elections. Besides, with many regional satraps now in awe of it and the party itself poised to make new inroads in States during the Assembly elections scheduled for 2021, the BJP thinks it is an idea whose time has come. This is precisely the reason why the Prime Minister is fast-tracking this proposal. Of course, there are complexities. Sidestepping these will require constitutional amendments to the Representation of People’s Act, 1951, the anti-defection law and others relating to rules of procedure with two-thirds majority in both Houses. Besides, such a move does not factor in mid-term situations where a State Government may choose to dissolve itself or fall because of a loss of majority. Would the Governor then not call fresh elections or hold on to a moribund Assembly till the dates of the next round of general elections are announced? What if the Central Government falls before the term of the Assemblies end? Such a move would then go against the spirit of democracy and lead to an absolutist control of federal polity. As it is, though we call ourselves a federal state, in reality we are a more centralised union of States. The “One nation, one election” formula would further strengthen this idea. Already, the Opposition, primarily the Left and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), has rightfully warned about the implicit idea of a monolithic State that such a move might encourage, fuelling such demands as “one nation, one culture, one language”. This centralisation may become more a syndrome than reform. Former Election Commissioner TS Krishnamurthy, too, had warned that without administrative alignments and ascertaining the practicalities of implementation, there is no point pushing through the proposal just for the heck of it. When the idea was placed before the Law Commission ahead of the general elections, it, too, had recommended that in order to equalise timelines, two conditions had to be met: First, a “motion for an early general election must be agreed to by at least two-thirds of all members of the House”. Second, “a no-confidence motion must be passed by the House, and with no alternative Government being confirmed within 14 days of passing a confidence motion”. The BJP knows it, too, but with the Opposition in tatters, it is keeping up its momentum.
