By H H Mohrmen
It is the dream of every right- minded citizen of this country to be part of free and fair elections, which are free from the influence of money and muscle power. But perhaps this is asking too much especially in a country like India, but is it impossible to have an election where the voters are free from any threat and intimidation? Is it possible to have election free of abetting, appeasement or personal aggrandizement in any shape or form? Can we even dream of having such an election in the state in general and particularly in Jaintia hills?
One of the most important goals of the NDA government under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi is to have corruption-free government but the moot question is can we have corruption-free governance with the kind of elections that we have? How can we expect a member of parliament, legislator or a councillor to uprightly and honestly perform his or her duty of representing the constituency when they have to spend a huge amount of money to win elections in the first place?
The beginning of corruption-free governance is in the election. Only a free and fair election can reduce corruption in the state and this will ultimately have positive impacts on any fight against corruption that we are all familiar with in Meghalaya.
What is the basis of the allegations that so much is at stake and huge amounts of money are spent during the elections? How does money flow during election? Any responsible citizen will agree that election is a tamasha and it starts with the candidate having to serve tea snacks and food to the electorate in his constituency who visited his/her residence throughout the electioneering period. Privately or not as openly as tea, snacks and food is the free flow of booze. Of course candidates will deny that they provide drinks and that it’s the supporters who treat the hoi polloi to all sorts of drinks. But can’t the candidate stop his supporters from dishing out booze?
During the election season people make a beeline for the candidate’s office to request for money for all sorts of reasons. Some will claim that they need to clear the hospital bills, still some come for school expenditure for their kids and coincidentally elections always fall during school admission season. Young people will even ask for money to see a show, go for picnics or for enjoying a concert and the candidates are to be blamed for this because no candidate wants to disappoint any potential voter during election.
A large chunk of money is also spent when candidates pay money to village leaders such as the Rangbah Shnong (headman) or Rangbah Dong (sub-locality heads), or self-proclaimed leaders with the hope that these will in turn canvass for them. The leader’s house in the respective village is like a hub where the supporters meet and devise plans to approach voters in the village. The leader also provides tea snacks and food to the voters at his residence but a large amount of money is spent in paying voters in key areas. Almost all candidates (or their supports) engage in such practices but this is done in a very clandestine manner.
Candidates also spend a lot of money in organising daily campaigns during the electioneering period where hundreds of vehicles which include buses, Sumos, taxis etc., are hired to transport supporters from their respective villages to the venue of the meeting. Every night hundreds of vehicles are used for more than twenty days. This constitutes a major expenditure that every candidate incurs during elections.
Then a few days before the campaign period ends there are rallies and voters are not only paid for conveyance to the place where the rally is held, but they are even paid a day’s wage and free food. Drinks are served clandestinely. These are some of the major expenditures which are unaccounted and which also makes every election an expensive proposition – a game only the rich can indulge in.
We can change the way we engage ourselves during the election if we all join hands together. Of course the rich would not want the system to change because then they will have to compete with educated, resourceful and highly efficient but poor candidate and they know they would not fare well in that kind of competition, so they will find ways to stop such a move.
Here are a few suggestions for minimising expenditure during elections. First we need to ensure that the candidate reduces the use of vehicles for election campaign. To begin with the Dorbar Shnong (DS) can regulate the numbers of vehicles that the candidate can take to a campaign in their village. This is easy to implement and the DS can inform the candidates that they only want him/her to address the community and restrict to one or two cars at the most. The Rangbah Shnong (RS) can also give an assurance that the residents of the village will attend the campaign and give a patient hearing to the candidates’ campaign and that he need not outsource crowds from other villages.
The DS can even ask the candidate to come only with few of his canvassers and not bring crowds. After all, the villagers only want to listen to the candidate and not his canvassers who only engage in mudslinging, personal attacks and empty rhetoric. The voters need to hear from the candidate what his policy, approaches and plans to serve the constituency are and not from the canvassers who cannot promise anything. We also need to stop giving importance to the canvassers because as we all know most of them are also paid a hefty sum of money. The support of some important leaders in the constituency and in many cases even the RS does not come cheap.
The Dorbar Shnong should be neutral during elections and the Rangbah Shnong should refrain from coming up openly to support any candidate as this will jeopardise the neutrality of the DS. It is only when the DS is neutral that equal opportunity can be given to all the all candidates contesting in the election. This is a challenging proposition because people want to be RS during elections because there is something to it and candidates also try to influence the community that only their supporters become RS in key areas to be able to influence the election.
The DS can make a huge difference in the effort to make elections in the state free and fair in letter and spirit. In fact the DS is a major stake holder in the entire process. Hence if the RS is fair and does not openly side with any candidate, it is possible to control expenditure during elections, beginning at the grass roots.
Initially I was hoping that demonetization of currency will also help curb expenditure during election, but replacing lower currency notes with the higher ones will only aggravate the already bad situation. The way I see it, demonetization of one thousand and five hundred rupee notes will not help make elections fairer and freer. For election purposes if we only have currency notes in smaller denominations say like hundred, fifty and twenty rupee notes then that can help curb elction expenditure of candidates.
Another blessing in disguise comes from the National Green Tribunal’s interim ban on export of coal from the state and hence the influence of coal money during election. If the ban continues to operate then it will be quieter on that front during elections. This will have a huge impact on the election scenario in the state and in Jaintia Hills in particular.
If we can only check the flow of money during elections, then half of the battle is won because then we will get better candidates to represent us in Parliament, the Assembly and the Councils and we will also be able to put a stop to dynastic politics.
The press too is a major stake holder. If at all there is any effort to improve the election in the state then the press can start by not giving undue importance to news of candidates giving out chairs, pots and pans and personal aggrandisement to individual. The press should stop providing space to news which will help the candidates in the election. Civil society apart from the DS should also take active part if we are to succeed in our endeavour to improve elections in the state.
Before the last 2013 assembly election, ICARE was contemplating of ways to address this vital issue but abandoned the idea due to paucity of funds and time constraints. Hopefully this time ICARE will be able to take the lead in the move to improve elections in the state.