Democracy threatened by democratically elected leaders

Narendra Modi is a democratically elected leader, but his image is that of a leader who decimated opposition and dissent — in Parliament or on university campuses.

Like the many firsts to his credit, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pronouncement on August 15th that he would be back on the ramparts of the Red Fort next year too will go down in history as one when a Prime Minister of India chose to appropriate an otherwise solemn occasion for delivering an election speech peppered by uncharitable remarks on the opposition parties.

Modi turned a blind eye to the great tradition of Indian Prime Ministers who never let electoral challenges muddy their address to the nation. This ignoble first — deciding to convert the Independence Day Speech into a stump speech — is a regrettable turn in familiar demagoguery by the Prime Minister.

A week before Independence Day, the Modi government brought a Bill in the Rajya Sabha for changing the composition of the committee for appointment of Election Commissioners and the Chief Election Commissioner. In view of certain questions over the recent functioning of the election watchdog, this further adds to the suspicion whether such selection criteria shall be able to garner the confidence of political parties.

These two instances exemplify the larger issues and concerns with respect to the overall disdain Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have for the democratic processes and traditions, apart from the idea of free and fair elections.

Modi continually dubs the Opposition as working against national interests only because it opposes him, his style of governing, and his party’s ideology. This, in effect, means that Modi thinks he is the nation itself. His electoral ambition looms over the sanctity of the norms and institutions that make India a democracy.

While democracy is a global public good, its effectiveness and impact can vary depending on the specific context within each country. The Constituent Assembly debates help us understand that India chose the parliamentary form of democracy primarily due to its historical and cultural context, as well as the influence of British colonial rule. Beginning with the first general elections in 1952, India’s democratic journey was gaining strength before it encountered the first major challenge in 1975 when Emergency was imposed. The curbs imposed on freedoms seriously impacted this pursuit.

This is mentioned here to underline the paradox of democratic processes. It is important to understand and acknowledge that people who come to occupying high offices through a democratic process may not necessarily have a strong commitment to democratic values.

What we are currently witnessing in India is a manifestation of this democratic paradox, and a repeat of the Emergency years, of course without it being officially declared. While censorship defined the Emergency years, the current challenge to democracy comes from a successful blurring of the distinction between propaganda and information. This kind of propaganda has been spread to such a preposterous extent that any critique of the government’s policy is presented as positioning against the nation itself. The leader, his party, and the nation are supposed to have blended with each other, and in the process the finest principles of democracy in general and parliamentary democracy in particular have suffered multiple injuries.

These injuries have been caused by leaders who passed the electoral test of democracy, and yet they have no investment in protecting it. There are several examples from different countries which helps us appreciate that the subversion of democracy by democratically elected leaders is a complex phenomenon that becomes possible due to certain conditions. We must appreciate that holding elections periodically alone does not constitute a democracy. Democracy is a mode of governance which embodies values such as equality, freedom, justice, and participation. If the leader promotes these democratic values even beyond elections, it inspires the confidence of the people in the leader, as well as in the government. When there is such confidence, no research paper can make the people doubt that the elections were rigged or manipulated.

What is evident is that upon being elected to office in 2014, Prime Minister Narendra Modi sought to consolidate and centralise power within the PMO and with him. This practice got a shot in the arm when he was voted back to power in 2019. This consolidation and centralisation were done through exploiting existing loopholes and infirmities of the system, and deliberate weakening of checks and balances. This has adversely impacted the independence of institutions such as the judiciary, the media, and the civil society. Modi is a ‘democratically elected’ leader, but his image over the past nine years is that of a leader who has actively decimated opposition and dissent in any form — be it in Parliament or on university campuses.

Elections alone do not legitimise leaders who undermine the very democracy that elevated them to power. The narrative we heard from the ramparts of the Red Fort last Tuesday should serve as a stark reminder that leaders consumed by the pursuit of re-election and power consolidation can irreparably harm the democratic foundations, and suffocate national aspirations.

(Manoj Kumar Jha is an RJD leader, and Member of the Rajya Sabha. Twitter: @manojkjhadu)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.