Discourse of Democracy

2019

Indian democracy unlike other democracies of the world has its own modernity. It is still a building process and the success of democracy is quite a challenge in a country like India where there are many social cleavages. How democracy is different in India is explored here. There is changing nature of the party system and also how the society changed is explored here.

IIC Quarterly, 2021

I will, in this overview, look into the process of the emergence of democracy in India, how the democratic idea was spread by the Indian national movement, and how it was sought to be implemented by the independent Indian nation state. I will end by highlighting the current challenges to this process, which has reached alarming proportions today. At the outset one must set aside the oft-repeated notion that democracy was a gift of British colonialism in India. Colonialism by definition represents the very opposite of democracy. It is the denial of political, economic and cultural freedom to the colonised people. THE NATIONAL MOVEMENT AND DEMOCRACY Democracy in India was a product of it being a critical element in the imagination of the nation by the anti-imperialist national movement that emerged in India in the second half of the 19th century. The nation that was imagined by Indian nationalists was to be independent, democratic, secular, inclusive of all kinds of diversity and pro-poor-a vision that Rabindranath Tagore, Jawaharlal Nehru and others termed 'the idea of India'. As Mahatma Gandhi said, such an independent democratic nation or 'Swaraj … will not be a free gift of the British…. It will be a declaration of India' s full self-expression…. It is a treasure to be purchased with a nation' s best blood'. 1 At almost the same time as the early Indian nationalists had started the process of nation formation, or what they called the process of 'the Indian nation-in-the-making' with this vision or 'idea of India', British colonial rulers campaigned for the exact opposite.

The Allied Victory at the end of 1945 was the most decisive moment in recent history, setting the world on a path to democracy. Confronted with war, human brutality and the consequences of unquestionable power in the hands of a fascist, the experience coerced government systems to be planned with human rights, liberty, division of power and with the idea of inclusion in mind. Now decades later, we are witnessing the reaction to the set policies, the dust from the war has long settled, and most of the generation who has experienced the war no longer have the power to direct the future of the world. The advancement of democracies has slowed down and in some cases even reversed its course mainly due the lack of visible consequences of the degree of destruction brought about by authoritarian leaders in World War Two and during the Cold War era. If we look at the world from the lens of generation time, we realize that only we have only passed three or four generations since the second World War, two generations maximum since the ending of the Cold War. Our Grandparents would have been alive at the time of war, and they were the forefathers of the liberal future order that was established for us. The rise of Post Modernism only intensifies the lack of structure and the distance from our history. The idea that there is no objective concrete truth is an unintentional blow that the liberal order would have never conceived. Rejecting and ignoring history creates ignorant voters who disregard the consequences wrought by the decisions of their predecessors. Lack of political knowledge and information amongst current voters is appalling and this translates to voting driven by ignorance and misinformation. Information overload due to extensive media coverage of tragic news has also brought about a bout of compassion fatigue in the population. This lack of empathy heavily translates in voter preference of authoritarians who preach about national or self interest and to a steady decline in interest towards human rights.

Context: Independent India has seen two stints of authoritarianism. The first was in 1975 when the internal emergency was declared and the second stint started in 2014 after the present ruling party came to power. However, the two cases had different backgrounds. In this paper, the background of each of the cases will be studied; the differences and the commonality between the two would also be highlighted along with the intervening circumstances that led to each of these two tendencies in Independent India. The first period was a result of political compulsion, elitist ego and political short-sightedness, international and national image of populism. It was devoid of any ideological consideration. Whereas, the second phase we are going through, is qualitatively different and driven by ideology. In the first case, proclamation of internal emergency was not a pre-decided course, whereas, second one appears to be planned and being executed with precision without any real proclamation. India's Independence, and politically Isolated Groups:

Democracy is an important milestone marking people's history and present. Quintessentially, people's democracy or hoi polloi democracy has two components. The first component informs us that people's participation in institutions is sine qua non of democracy. The second component depicts the realisation of being participants. Thus people's participation in institutions and the realisation of being participants together constitute democracy. The celebration and adoption of first component and ignorance or omission of second component pave the way for a fragmented (non-inclusive) democracy. Liberal democracy is essentially a fragmented democracy due to the adoption of first component and negation of the second. Therefore, liberal democracy becomes fragmented and hoi oligoi democracy. In this backdrop, it becomes crucial to examine the Indian democracy not only from the celebrated liberal formula of 'one person, one vote' but also by exhibiting the real componen...

IIC Quarterly, 2022

The rise of right wing authoritarian leaders and movements in liberal democracies are an indication of some of the underlying problems with the nature of liberal democracy itself. The belief that democracy requires a level homogeneity can be traced back to Carl Schmitt who identified some of these problems in the time of the Weimar Republic. However, liberal democracies may need to take leaf out of Ambedkar's writings to address the current threat to the liberal democratic order.

LSE Review of Books, 2018

Routledge eBooks, 2022

Indian Journal of Public Administration, 2017

The dawn of 21st century has witnessed some new features of democratic politics that seem to be shifting away from what we call democratic. The impact of globalisation has created such a nexus among elites of politics-corporates-media that has made political regimes to ignore the democratic norms and well-being of common masses and overemphasise economic growth and corporate-friendly policy priorities. Besides, the approach of the political actors (parties and politicians), in the process of power-seeking, has shown unconventional trends. These features do not resemble either dictatorship or totalitarianism; rather they depict trends of aristocratic mode of decision-making by using democratic framework and institutions. Such trends have been termed as 'post-democracy' by recent Western scholarship. Indian politics is not an exception. These trends have created an imbalance between interest of social classes and corporative interests which has prompted political regimes to take tough decisions, in despotic ways. Though the present article does not posit that Indian democracy is on the brink, it attempts to underline the post-democratic features visible in Indian politics through examination of (a) party politics in terms of democratic framework, ideology, policy initiations and reforms, electioneering, etc.; (b) politicians-corporates-media nexus; and (c) modes and trends of politicians in communicating and relating with the electorate.

International Journal of Research and Analytical Reviews (IJRAR) , 2020

Founding Fathers of Indian Constitution and Multi Dimensional Politics has promoted the liberty, justice, inclusiveness, equality among all and fraternity that protects universal brotherhood among Indian Citizens. They had granted more rights to citizens in an unbiased and impartial manner irrespective of religion, race, gender, occupation, place of birth, caste or creed because they believed in an United Sovereign Democratic Republic which could listen and act on any form of social, economic or political justice as they wanted political democracy to survive and prevent India from moving towards Majoritarian Nationalism and ensure political equality and democratic rights to be protected and Indian Politics should be regulated by Constitutional Machineries with equity and good conscience to fulfill their constitutional obligation towards the state and individual. Indian Democracy is an Systematic Organisation of Governance where Collective Decision and opinions of the People of India are deliberated on political forums through the existence of political institutions.