I always have an
opinion about votes, but I almost always shy away from debates on voting. It’s
frankly because till date I haven’t had an opportunity to vote. (I’ve seem almost 6 to 8 elections pass by
btw) You can simply say I’m lazy, I don’t care about electing, or I still don’t
feel empowered enough to actually believe that my vote can make a difference.
The General
Elections of India are probably one of the biggest democratic exercises on the
face of earth, and with it comes a lot of drama, games, schemes, garlands, and
well... some shoes too. The problem in the Indian electoral system since the
earliest times has been the voter turnout. People don’t see it to be worth the
effort. The average voter turnout in
the General Elections is around 60% meaning less than two thirds of the people
were responsible for deciding whom to elect and assuming two thirds voted for
the party(ies) forming the government, only about 40% of the total (voting) population
of India chose the ruling party. So about 60% were in no way responsible for
the central government! But I’m sure they had their share of complaining on how
dysfunctional the government is. (Me included)
Ok here’s little
info,
Voter turnout
can actually say a lot, they are generally used to send political messages too.
The 72% voter turnout in the Assembly election of Arunachal Pradesh in 2009 was
hailed by the media and a few voices in India as a message against the Chinese
aggressive pursuit of annexing Arunachal Pradesh. Similarly this time around
(2014) certain groups... well ok terrorists (I was just trying do a Reuters and
not use the word terrorist :D ) put up signs and distributed flyers telling
people not to vote, in an attempt to show that Kashmiris don’t feel like voting
or participating in the democratic system of India.
 |
| www.mirror.co.uk |
Now lemme tell
you why I haven’t had a chance to vote yet. When I turned 18 I was sure I could
cast my vote in the coming election, I was born in the beginning of the year
and by the time the next election came in 2008 I was eager and well, had not
yet figured anything in politics but wanted to vote, I was eager and was taken
by the ‘right to vote’ thing. But my name was not in the list, disappointment.
The next election was in 2009, I tried to register myself, the clerk at the official
looking koisk asked me to fill form and took 2 or 3 photos, loksabha election
2009 – ‘sorry your name is absent in the list’, ok. 2010 – Municipal election,
the guys came home (supposedly) and we weren’t at home; result – no vote. It’s
been so through till now. In the initial
days I wanted a voter ID so that I can have an address proof, (then I got my
passport, so lost interest all the more) Oh I forgot, last time I registered
online, after everything is done, they want us to take a print of the sheet and
goto the election commission office of our district, I got the print, but sadly
never found time to do the submitting part. OK enough about me.
Speaking of
Democracy itself, I feel it doesn’t work too well with India. I mean, in a
country like India, the biggest and most diverse democracy of the world, we
need to tailor the idea of democracy. What we currently have is a crude form of
democracy that involves participation of everyone at once. How can you actually
expect one hundred crore people to actually come out and vote? In fact if the
100 crore came out to vote, I’m not sure we have enough logistics to support
that kind of a turn out. What I’m trying to say is this idea of total participative
democracy is actually a failure. It doesn’t work. We cant have everyone voting at
once... because ‘everyone’ is NOT everyone. Maybe we need stages, maybe
increase the levels, cut the power, maybe increase hierarchy... who knows that
might have its own problems, but my point is, low voter turnout will remain a
problem in this crude form of total participation. Thats it!
Btw facebook
pics, all the ‘be responsible’ ads and everything is making voting a glamorous
thing, which is good.. might just get the urbans to vote.. but hey.. I still haven’t
voted.. not even fashion can me vote.. I wonder how anyone would vote.
