As the Election Day nears our constituency, two questions are growing stronger in my mind for attention. Unfortunately I don’t really have the right answers in sight. The following are my questions…
a. Why there isn’t any option called ‘None of the above’ in EVM?
b. Should I vote in that case?
Hang on. I’m sure you are going to shower me with your pieces of wisdom on my responsibilities in a democratic system :) I’m certainly aware of that but still can’t help but give my attentions to these two questions. Just to put it in record that I did make the appropriate use of my voting right whenever I got the opportunity and I do have an EPIC – Election Photo Identity Card :)
I am completely in agreement with the good practice of using our democratic right but what do I do if I am left with no suitable choice? Why wouldn’t I get a suitable chance to register my disapproval of the candidates fielded by various political parties?
Section 49-O (Conduct of Election Rules, 1961) does allow one to complete the formalities and then abstain from voting. This requires the voter to record the reason in Form 17A in presence of the presiding officer. This is completely against the very basic principle of electoral process of offering secrecy to the voter of the choice that he makes. Just staying away from booth wouldn’t allow a sensible voter to register his angst and that’s not democracy. People may have various reasons not to be able to make it to the polling booth and many voters who choose not to vote just for not having the right candidate wouldn’t like to be counted in the same group.
Now let’s have some reality check and a look at some oven fresh statistics sourced from Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and National Election Watch (NEW)
Analysis of Candidates Contesting in First Phase of
West Bengal 2011 Assembly Elections
- 49 candidates i.e. 19.37 % (out of 253 analyzed) with self declared pending criminal charges contesting in the first phase of West Bengal Assembly Elections.
- 27 candidates out of these 49 analyzed have declared serious IPC charges like murder, attempt to murder, extortion and theft charges against them.
- All major parties have given tickets to candidates with pending criminal cases. Indian National Congress have 10 candidates out of 27 analyzed (37 %), CPI(M) has 8 out of 32 (25 %), BJP has 8 out of 48 (17 %), SUCI has 5 out of 9 (56 %) and All India Trinamool Congress has 4 out of 26 (15%) candidates analyzed with pending criminal cases.
- A total of 9 candidates (i.e. 4% of the total analyzed) are crore-patis.
- A total of 143 candidates (57 %) have declared that they have never filed income tax returns.
- Out of the above 253 candidates analyzed, 92 (36%) have not given PAN details.
Am I unreasonable if I say NO to the candidate whom I don’t consider to be a person with sufficient integrity to represent me in the legislative assembly or parliament or any such civic body for that matter?
I completely understand that providing the option of ‘None of the above” would basically call for an emergency as our faith on the politicians has reached its highest ever low. But there has to be accountability of the political outfits. We can’t continue to press button for jokers, criminals and drama queens sourced from various locations and at different price tags. We have bled enough. I maintain my stand that there certainly should be an option of “None of the above” as part of the electoral process reforms. This would be a powerful tool to make political parties responsible to certain extent if not completely.
I think asking for participation of members of civil society in a committee of representatives of civil society to draft a bill is not that brilliant idea. It would be way more logical to address the root of it and channel our positive energy to demand responsible behavior from political parties. I’m not ready to accept that I have to join the system to change the system all the time. Here I refer to the suggestions we often make that why don’t we join politics to clean the system. Joining politics is certainly not that difficult but why not that easy is going to be a long discussion. Is it too ambitious to expect that people who have consciously chosen the path of representing mass start acting genuinely and responsibly and most importantly without any biased intention!
