Capturing political autonomy and freedom of the States will translate the Constitution from flexible and federal to rigid and unitary
Published Date – 11:59 PM, Mon – 2 October 23
By Dr Nayakara Veeresha
With the formation of a High-Level Committee through a gazette notification on September 2, the Union government has begun the exercise of holding simultaneous elections to the three tiers of governing institutions in the country. It has mandated that the “HLC shall commence functioning immediately and make recommendations at the earliest”. The idea of holding simultaneous elections was first mooted by former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 1989-90 and 2003. This eventually found a place in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) election manifestos of 2014 and 2019.
The Union government has argued in favour of simultaneous elections on the basis of: economic efficiency — reducing election expenditure, constraint on good governance and development — easing the burden of Model Code of Conduct, rationalisation of administration — both permanent executive and para-military personnel, and logistical arrangements.
Opposition parties have counter-argued that the move of the Union government is purely a political opportunism. Besides this, other aspects that they have put forth are: attack on federalism, disturbing the parliamentary democracy and citizens right to elect their representatives. No doubt, all these are important, yet it appears that constitutional perspective is largely missing in the discourse. Hence, it is necessary to contextualise the idea of simultaneous elections from the perspective of forms of the Constitution.
Forms of Constitutions
Broadly there are two forms of Constitutions across the world. A unitary Constitution is one wherein the central polity assumes supremacy without subsidiary sovereign polities. In the Federal Constitution, both the Centre and States co-exist and have sovereignty in their respective domains. The Constitution makers adopted this dual polity for India, meaning, it is federal during normal or peace times and turns unitary during wartime. This means that the Indian Constitution was deliberately chosen and made to be flexible federalism rather than the rigid mode of the US Constitution.
Dr BR Ambedkar expressed that “In normal times, it is framed to work as a federal system. But in times of war it is so designed as to make it work as though it was a unitary system” while introducing the Draft Constitution on 4 November 1948. A critical point is that it shall function as unitary only in the war or some extraordinary circumstances but not in normal or peace time.
The Union government’s idea of holding simultaneous elections is an attempt to translate the basic structure of the Constitution, more specifically parliamentary democracy where the preference is given to the responsibility of the Executive over the stability of the same. The responsibility of the Executive is ensured through daily and periodic assessment by the Indian Constitution.
The proposal of simultaneous elections tinkers with the periodic assessment of the electorate and deprives the citizens of the right to hold the political executive accountable to Parliament. The passage of farm and labour laws provides ample justification for the current ruling dispensation’s systematic alienation of daily assessment of the political executive.
In the absence of the ‘right to recall’ or referendum for the enactment and passage of laws, simultaneous elections will only further alienate the electorate from the governing people thereby affecting the transparency and accountability of the parliamentary democracy. The political stability evolved out of debates and discussions ensures much-needed social legitimacy than the one which is acquired through monopoly of power and authority. The unregulated acquisition of electoral power is always endangering democracy through the authoritarian mode of governance.
Crucial Amendment
Simultaneous elections needs amendments to Articles 83, 85, 172, 174, and 356 along with the necessary changes in the Representation of the People’s Act, 1950, and 1951.
However, amendment to Article 1 which is the most crucial is being missed out in the ongoing discourse. This implies a change or alteration in the ‘India that is Bharat shall be a Union of States’, thereby paving the way for the transition from federal to unitary state, although the Union government has set the precedent for this also in the form of printing official documents in the name of Bharat in place of India and the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, Bill for the laws related to Criminal Code.
The amendments to these Articles will adversely affect the state’s political sovereignty in the long run. Since 1950, Article 356 has been misused for political purposes in more than 125 instances.
Financial Implications
Besides the constitutional and political challenges, the financial implications of holding simultaneous elections are high. The economic growth of the States during 1950-1967 was less when compared with the growth rates after the 1970s. The reason for holding simultaneous elections during the birth of parliamentary democracy is quite different from that of the one we are living in current times. During 1950-1967, the forces of Balkanisation were imminent and hence forced the then government to go for simultaneous elections.
Simultaneous elections require an additional Rs 10,000 crore to procure EVMs along with the current expenditure, according to estimates. This might cause a burden on the Union government that has already curtailed the social sector expenditure by reducing the tax burden on the corporate sector. No doubt, the elections are an expensive affair yet it is worth spending to preserve and protect parliamentary democracy and federal constitutional design.
The proposed simultaneous elections to the three tiers of governing institutions alters the fundamental tenets of the Constitution. Most significantly, curtailing the electorate from multiple to the unitary exercise of vote at a single time for all the tiers of governance has a high probability of turning advantageous to the ruling dispensation. Parliamentary democracy and federal governance are the core constituents of the Indian Constitution.
Simultaneous elections as an idea is good and might benefit the party in power in the short run. However, it alters the ‘basic structure’ of the Constitution in the long run. The efforts of the Union government to capture the political autonomy and freedom of the States will eventually translate the form of the Constitution from flexible and federal to rigid and unitary.
