The moment a citizen becomes a karyatkarta, an informed citizen is lost
The panchayat elections have already been over, and the result has come after two months of intense election fever in Odisha. The public mood was tensed with all about election matters in villages during that period. Election debates were the regular gossip at the bathing ghat, pan shop and youth WhatsApp group, and village centre. Moreover, public debate and discussion are essential practices for democracy.
Panchayati Raj elections and institutions are vital for establishing grassroots democracy and planning and implementing development activities at the local level. In this context, it is not only essential to discuss free and fair elections but also on the informed debate, discussions and citizenship.
There were some disturbing as well as ideal incidents witnessed during the elections. A visual came in the public domain that in a village in Balangir, villagers allegedly auctioned the local Sarpanch position, but later, the district Collector intervened and conducted the election under strict supervision. In a few other places, candidates were allegedly indulged in distributing money to lure the voters. It is an open secret that money, muscle, and alcohol influence the public choice of representatives in rural areas.
On the contrary, an ideal practice was also reported in a village in Sundargarh district that candidates were asked to write their statement of purpose in an exam form. That is unusual in the panchayat level elections, which has been seen in some university campus elections and the presidential debates in the United States of America (USA). According to economist Amartya Sen, ‘public discussion and debates are crucial to exercise democracy and social choice’. And there must be informed public discussion with larger public participation in exercising democratic rights. However, the question arises as to why one group of citizens has chosen money and alcohol while the other chooses some form of debate and discussion before electing the candidates?
The answer lies between informed and uninformed citizens and the nature of political parties.
There are fashions these days by political parties to call the citizens karyakarta. They also boast about the numbers of karyakarta they have, and at the same time, the karyakartas are happy with their affiliations with the political parties. Karyakarta exercises power by connecting with local leaders, building roads and other civic works and earning money. They are also given certain positions and responsibilities in their local areas like mandal, block, zonal and panchayat president etc. Besides, most citizens in rural India area are uninformed about their constitutional rights. They consider political parties and Government above the republic and Constitution. It is because political parties connect with people directly and make party workers but not informed citizens. People perceive elections and candidates are profit-making businesses; therefore, they demand money from candidates during the campaign. They come to villages for votes during the election, but their behaviour changes when they win.
Therefore some citizens find the campaign period is the only time they can demand money from the candidates. Moreover, it is also witnessed that once a person becomes an elected member, if not anything but at least a house will be allotted in his/her name under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojna.
On the other hand, an informed citizen refers to constitutional rights and demands transparency and accountability from political leaders and parties. They are informed about the rights and provisions under the laws and the Indian constitution. They know that an informed citizen is above the political parties; thereby, they don’t prefer to be called karyakarta of any political party. They do not belong to any political parties; instead, they choose to remain an informed citizen above a political party.
In election and voting, they see the potential among the candidates and vote in favour of them. The incident in Sundargarh where sarpanch candidates were asked to write the exam indicates the decision and pressure from the informed citizen. In other words, ideal practices in democracy come from informed citizens.
It is to conclude that an ideal practice in the election comes from informed citizens. Democracy needs more informed citizens who are not affiliated with any political parties. The moment a citizen becomes a karyatkarta, an informed citizen is lost in the society because they have to follow the political parties and not directly to the constitution. We have more proactive political parties who make kartyakarta; on the contrary, fewer organisations/institutions/political parties make informed citizens. Therefore, there are more uninformed citizens than the informed ones in society, and till that equitation does not change, unethical practices will be continued during the elections.
(The writer is a PhD scholar at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai)