Democracy's Biggest Election Gets Underway In India
Almost a billion voters test Modi's commitment to democracy
970-million voters across India are heading to the polls today (April 19) in the world’s largest election.
It will challenge once again the old liberal doctrine that only affluent countries can be democracies.
Indians will be voting for 543 seats in the 545-seat lower house of parliament, called the Lok Sabha, with two other seats nominated by the country’s president.
While Prime Minister Modi is favored to win, his Party is not liked and his campaign has been marred by charges of unfair practices.
India is an improbable country.
It is a democracy with huge diversity. I remember talking with the head of India’s state TV channel and she said that her programs had to be translated into 1,000 languages each day.
Can a country that originated as a set of empires transform itself into a democracy?
Russia and China have not managed that trick; the former European monarchies and many of their offspring, plus Japan, Korea and India, have done so.
Thus far.
Now India is going to the polls in an election that could push it a bit further into the realms of the autocrats.
Is there a Trend to backsliding?
No.
Russia and China are not backsliding…they are just not “forward-sliding’. They are harnesses to a past that is holding them back.
And now they are trapped.
Both Russia and China have shrinking populations. Russia’s working-age population peaked in 2006 at around 90 million and stands at less than 80 million today. China peaked at 900 million in 2011 and is now around 857 million. Estimates are that by 2050, the Chinese population will be half of its current size. The recent drops, respectively, of 10 million and 40 million, impact more than the rate of growth – they mean that the current working populations have to shoulder a larger burden of social and health-care support. And in both countries, the proportion of workers who are in the most productive age group—20 to 39—will further decline over the next decade.
Both publish economic numbers that would only fool a professional agency of accountants, who are paid to count, not critique.
Russia is near the bottom of the global scale for productivity and education (these are linked: more education means more productivity). China’s total factor productivity (TFP) has been declining dramatically since 2008; it is a “low-productivity super-power”. American productivity, BTW, is still the highest in the world.
They are in a cycle of decreasing quality of life and income. In such an atmosphere, couples are even less likely to want to have children…and that is the case in both countries, which suffer a decreasing birth rate.
Compare that to India.
Unheralded, it has emerged as a top-rated global power.
In fact, it will have the third-biggest global economy before the end of the decade, overtaking Japan and Germany. It’s GDP will grow at 6.3%/year till that time, during which it will double its size.
This year, its growth is stunning – world-best:
India will be the highest growing GDP in the world over the next eight years.
“India has the conditions in place for an economic boom fueled by offshoring, investment in manufacturing, the energy transition, and the country’s advanced digital infrastructure,” according to Morgan Stanley analysts.
India has it all:
India has the largest youth population in the world.
India has an estimated middle class of 400 million people who are the main drivers of consumption expenditure. Their consumption will increase four times by 2025. India’s strong economy is partly driven by this young demographic, which the rest of the Western world lacks…and they like to consume! Only 5.3% of its population is above 65 years old. More than half of India's population falls within the age bracket of 15-54 years (which includes >45% in the 22-54 year bracket, with a median age of 28.4 years, the most productive age group for an economy).
Its educational system drives advanced technology forward. India ranks third in the world in terms of number of PhDs in science and engineering. It has the most STEM (Science, Technology Engineering and Math) graduates of any country worldwide. The level of education (bachelor's and master's degree) under its tough education system is 77.7% (up from 18.3% about 10 years ago).
India has a very ambitious space program, stressing domestic value from space-based activities.
And Western tech companies that used to default to China as a source of labor are now shifting to India. The CEOs of prominent Fortune 500 companies (Google, Microsoft, and Nokia to name a few) are from India. Apple will move 5% of its global production for the iPhone 14 to India later this year and could also make 25% of all iPhones in the country by 2025. The UK’s PM hails from India.
India also embraces international relations on a personal level. It has the highest number of migrants in the world. Every year 2.5-million Indians migrate overseas. They maintain their connections with the mother country, and exchange innovation and skills.
India thus celebrates its emergence as a “non-Western” power – but that does not mean anti-Western. It is a rule-of-law state, with democracy as a common principle.
And unlike many assumptions, India actually has a long tradition of limited government and institutions of balanced power.
Democracy did not start in India with the British. In fact, the British period was one where colonial self-interest kept the Indian populations supressed. The Indian Forum states that:
“Republics, called sangha, were important forms of aristocracy and democracy at the time, side by side with kingdoms. Both Buddha and Mahavira came from republics of this kind. It is not surprising, then, that the Buddhist order of monks, also called sangha, was modelled on the deliberative bodies of the republics.”
That is why there is so much concern about the path being taken by PM Modi - there is a fear that India is sliding inexorably towards autocracy.
Modi has presided over an increase in arrests, intimidation and the alleged torture of lawyers, journalists and activists who speak out against him.
His Hindu nationalist government has amended its citizenship laws to favour Hindus over Muslims and has pledged to create a national register of citizens, prompting concern that millions of Muslims with inadequate paperwork will be unable to qualify for citizenship.
Modi doesn’t tolerate dissent: while in power he has not held a single press conference or given any unscripted interviews. India is now on several international lists as only ‘partly free’ or as a ‘flawed democracy’.
Yet his approval ratings are remarkably high. His government has tackled corruption and government inefficiency. The economy has flourished. He has poured his energy and oratorical skills into social media in order to get backing for public causes such as housing and sanitation. When Covid hit he quickly ordered a total lockdown of the entire country, saving millions of lives.
However, there is concern over electoral manipulation.
His government introduced a confusing system of political financing that has been declared unconstitutional by India’s Supreme Court. The system involved the purchase of “electoral bonds” by companies and individuals, which were political donations. The Supreme Court ordered the release of names of the donors, and lo and behold Modi’s BJP was the prime beneficiary of hundreds of millions of dollars of donations. Some of the corporations donated bonds that were worth more than their profits, making curious observers wonder where the money was really coming from.
Some of the companies that donated large amounts to the BJP were later awarded major government contracts.
Further, almost all of the investigations launched by the Enforcement Directorate have focused on the Opposition parties. It looks more like harassment than punishment; less than 0.5% of the investigations have led to convictions. Almost all of the investigations went away if the subjects converted to Modi’s party.
The Supreme Court’s actions provide reassurance that there is still independent oversight in India. I can’t imagine that court being able to operate in Putin’s Russia or Xi’s China.
And independent journalists and media organisations are still effective in holding the government to account. Their pooled resource are investigating the electoral bonds scandal and providing critical election coverage. Social media is making its own impact; a video by a young influencer, Dhruv Rathee, a young influencer who accused Modi of cultivating a dictatorship recently went viral with 25 million views.
Commentators on his podcast were emotionally moved and were in tears with his support of democracy.
With champions like this, a dictatorship will be hard to impose.
With one possible avenue open to a plotting autocrat…
Relations between Hindus and Muslims in India are getting tense. The Modi government embraces a far-right Hindu nationalism known as Hindutva. Hindutva is the belief in the hegemony of Hinduism in India and the establishment of the country as a Hindu, rather than secular, state. Much like MAGA and Christianity. They have become so forward that they are now openly calling for the genocide of Muslims in India.
In 2002 when Modi was chief minister of Gujarat state an estimated 2,000 Muslims were hacked or burned to death by Hindu extremists while Modi prevented the police from coming to their help. The founder of Genocide Watch, Dr. Gregory Stanton, says that Modi uses “anti-Muslim, Islamophobic rhetoric” to build his political base. Only Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists and Jains are entitled to call themselves "Hindu," according to the Hindutva doctrine, whereas Muslims and Christians are excluded.
This speaks to a key part of the Indian environment. India is a vast but in some ways an artificial entity. It can even be argued that before Britain, there was no “India”. Just as before the British, there was no dish called “curry” – it is a British assembly of various spices, and has no single counterpart in India. There are hundreds of languages spoken in the country and no such thing as a homogenous Indian culture or people. Groups like the Kashmiris and Sikhs have struggled for decades to achieve independence from what they see as the yoke of Indian colonialism.
If democracy is kept alive, they can all thrive in one house that has a place for everyone. If Modi insists on pushing everyone into a Hindu box, it will fall apart.
I hope it stays together; it is a wonderful and place of rich experiences and a brave experiment for diversity-as-a-strength.
I wish all my friends in India the best as they vote. The process will take 44 days – the second-longest voting period in the country’s history (the longest was 120 days in 1951) – so it will be some time before we look at the results.
But we already have a reason to celebrate. Thus far, democracies are growing, and autocracies are shrinking. India is playing its part. Keep watching!
Fascinating! I personally am a bit conflicted about India, worked with Indians a lot, both as bosses and as colleagues, all male. Smart but painfully mired in patriarchy. Education may be able to pull them out from this archaic culture but it's going to be messy. Also smelly, very smelly. Sorry!
Fascinating place. I would have liked to go for a very long visit. As it was I went twice. Loved Bollywood movies, the music, the food, the people, and even learnt a little Hindi. Having an Indian diaspora has been beneficial to the world. I wish them well. Thanks for this post. 😊