Polls in India and U.S.
SATINATH SEN
This year’s Presidential election in the United States, more than any before it, has generated a high degree of excitement and expectations at home and abroad. Besides the closer official relations between India and the U.S., an increasing number of Indians in the U.S. has created a connectedness of its own. Though differing in form and age, democracy is firmly entrenched in both our nations. The similarities and differences between the two are fascinating and reflect on the history and culture of the countries.
Funding is an area of major difference. In the U.S., state funding is in vogue, though this time Barack Obama has decided to forego it and has relied entirely on public funding. Even public funding is highly transparent with limits and reporting norms that are strictly adhered to. In India, no state funding exists and the whole thing is wrapped in secrecy. Consequently, the public is unaware of who the leaders are in debt and what kind of payback can be expected. Rules exist on limits of expenditure which are more breached than observed. Funding by interest groups exists in the U.S. too but is done openly and without the veil of hypocrisy that prevails here.
Media’s role
The other difference is a result of the presidential form where contestants face off against each other. Our elections are a fight between two parties and their prime ministerial candidates, announced or assumed. In the U.S., the candidates are subjected to a merciless analysis of their views on various issues and their utterances over a long period of time and their conduct in public or private. The electronic media brings out every trait of the candidates out in the open for the electorate to absorb and assess. In contrast electronic media in India, for lack of wit or will, lets off candidates lightly. Media doesn’t hold our politicians to account as much as it does there. The result is an abundance of hollow promises, with no intention of ever keeping them.
Electioneering is generally high on economic promises. The putative recipient of such largesse is ‘aam admi’ in India. In the land still haunted by McCarthy’s ghost, ‘socialism’ has become a much-derided term.
Square deal?
The economic meltdown has forced the Republicans to turn grudgingly to Main Street but can ill conceal their natural affinity to Wall Street and take frequent digs at agents who propose ‘spreading the wealth’. Candidates in the U.S. promise to cut down pork barrel schemes, while in India, pork barrel is institutionalised in the form of Members of Parliament Local Area Development or the MPLAD scheme.
India is often accused of not dealing fair and square with its minorities or womenfolk. Yet gender or race never becomes an election issue as much as in the U.S. This year’s Democratic primary is hailed as a phenomenon because it was an attempt to break the twin glass ceilings of race and gender.
Booth capturing, physically preventing voters from casting vote and such other malpractices seen in India are rare in the U.S. But it is a distinction without a difference. Voter suppression by other means like asking improbable identity proof, etc., is not uncommon there. It’s a tribute to the people of our two nations that we retain an unshakeable faith in democracy, warts and all.
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