JOIN USTainted candidates, unlimited funding, and no need to be transparent
Two weeks ago, the Supreme Court imposed penalties, Rs 17 lakh in all, on nine political parties, holding them guilty of contempt. According to the court, two national parties were in total violation of the earlier orders of its Constitution Bench that required them to publicly disclose the reasons for selecting individuals accused of serious crimes as electoral candidates. In the 2020 Bihar Assembly elections, seven other national and regional parties had also not only fielded men wanted in crimes like murder, attempt to murder, rape, rioting, kidnapping, using illegal fire arms and explosives, extortion, theft and cheating but also explained away their choice claiming that those police cases were either “politically motivated” or “not serious in nature”. Perhaps our understanding of “heinous crimes” needs to align now with such “liberal views” of those who seek to represent us as lawmakers.
While penalising these political parties, the court agonised over Parliament’s failure to pass a law to disqualify suspects of serious crimes from contesting elections, despite its repeated recommendations, as well those from the central government’s own Law Commission, to do so.
Not only legislatures, where political parties often look after their self-interests very energetically, to the detriment of the “larger public interest”, but the executive also defers to their desire to be opaque and unaccountable to the people by instituting deceptive measures couched in the language of transparency. For example, in 2017, the central government announced Electoral Bonds (EBs) as a mode of ensuring unlimited funding for political parties from individuals, desi corporates and desi subsidiaries of foreign companies. Donor identity, however, is guarded closely, as if it were a matter of national security. The challenge to the legality of this manner of making political donations -- unparalleled anywhere else in the world -- is languishing in the Supreme Court since 2018.
That is not all, government records of the decision-making process to float Electoral Bonds are also sarkari secrets. My RTI appeal on this issue has been pending since January 2018. In another case, the SBI with its State-guaranteed monopoly over the sale and redemption of these bonds, is resisting public disclosure of those transactions by claiming customer confidentiality. Next, the Income Tax Department has refused to reveal the income tax returns of political parties claiming -- believe it or not -- “personal privacy.”
Political parties, it seems, are now entitled to privacy just like individuals, even though the Central Information Commission ruled 13 years ago that these are public documents.
This is not how political party finances are treated in other countries. Take the example of the Pacific island of Fiji. Since 2013, a special law is in place to regulate political parties, their finances and activities. It empowers citizens to walk into the head office or the district office of any political party and demand inspection of their records.
On the other side of the globe, South Africa, earlier this year, brought into force a law to regulate political party funding. Political donations are not only capped, source-wise, but parties are also required to regularly publish their income and expenditure details through the Electoral Commission. Further, South Africa simultaneously amended its RTI law (locally known as PAIA) to require all political parties to proactively disclose their funding sources to the people. Additionally, any person can demand access to their records by submitting a formal PAIA application to them directly. The public scandal involving the controversial Gupta brothers, who are said to have bribed their way into the upper ranks of the ruling African National Congress, is often cited as a major push factor for these reform measures.
Nepal, which we take seriously only when the government of the day leans towards Beijing, has covered political parties squarely under its RTI Act, since 2007.
I have chosen only these examples, out of several, because there are many amongst us who are acutely allergic to all ideas foreign, unless they are transformed into top-brand mobile phones, laptops, automobiles, TV sets, air-conditioners, refrigerators or bullet trains that can be brandished as symbols of their status. Some 38% of Fiji’s population is of Indian origin, as is the very accomplished 2.5% of South Africa’s. According to official statistics, more than 80% of Nepal’s population is Hindu. If these countries with large Indian populations can take resolute steps toward making political parties transparent and accountable during and between elections, why can’t we expect and do the same in India from our ‘Vishwaguru’ rulers?