Beware, Mr Lyngdoh

First it was Venkaiah Naidu, the BJP president, who talked of the need to reunite central and state elections. Now it's L.K. Advani, the deputy prime minister, who is doing so. The reasons he has advanced are clear and cogent. Beginning in 1971, when the late Indira Gandhi called parliamentary elections a year early (her breakaway Congress party, the Congress-I, was going through an uncomfortable period of minority rule), the country has now reached such a pass where there is a parliamentary, or a group of state assembly, elections every year. This has put the country in 'permanent election mode', virtually crippling the central government by making it face popularity tests almost every year.

The Centre's paralysis was partial when there was single-party rule in Delhi. It became complete in 1996 when the Congress not only lost the parliamentary elections but also its 50-year dominance of Indian democracy. Since then, coalition governments have been the order of the day. No year has passed when one or the other member of these coalitions has not faced an election in its home state and therefore been adamantly opposed to any measure that could inflict loss or dislocation on even a tiny segment of their electorate. For seven years, India has been like a giant oil tanker adrift in the high seas without a rudder. Shipwreck is only a matter of time.

The BJP has been aware of this problem for some time. Earlier, Prime Minister Vajpayee used to advocate a fixed five-year term for Parliament and the legislatures. But this met with few takers because it would have destroyed the most basic prop of the Westminster-style democracy, the right of the PM or chief minister to threaten his party with dissolution in order to ensure support for the policies decided upon by the cabinet.

Advani has revived the idea of reunification, but in a more limited form. He spoke at some length about the loss of powers at the Centre and correctly concluded that it can be remedied only when governments in New Delhi no longer face a virtual referendum on their policies every year—thereby be able to make tradeoffs between the short-term political cost and long-term political benefits from their policies. But instead of constitutional changes that would bring the two sets of elections back in line, he has sought only to persuade the Election Commission to unite the four state assembly elections scheduled for the end of this year with not only the LS elections scheduled for late next year but also the state assembly elections for Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh.

The EC would do well to examine this proposal closely before it gives its assent to arbitrarily changing the dates of the assembly elections to suit the Centre's convenience. Advani's reasoning is impeccable, but, regrettably, his motives seem to be mainly political. He is aware, no doubt, that the 'anti-incumbency' factor (a normal feature of Indian politics now) is likely to work in the BJP's favour in at least three, and possibly all four, of the states that go to the polls this winter—Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Delhi and Chhattisgarh. He is also aware that this sentiment is growing in Maharashtra, where it could work in the party's favour and against the uneasy coalition of the Congress and Sharad Pawar's Nationalist Congress Party. By uniting these elections with the LS polls, Advani wants to overcome the somewhat weaker anti-incumbency sentiment that the BJP is likely to encounter next year in the Lok Sabha polls.

There's nothing wrong with making such calculations, for these are the essence of a Westminster-style democracy—and have been used time and again in the country. Had all the above state governments been under the BJP, it could have simply asked the CMs to dissolve their assemblies at the same time as Vajpayee dissolves the LS.But asking the EC to change the election dates of state assemblies that are under the control of a rival party is another matter altogether. If the Commission under CEC J.M. Lyngdoh agrees to what is surely a political manoeuvre, it'll erode much of the respect and credibility that it enjoys today. That is the very last thing this country needs today.

If the BJP wants to unite central and state elections, it should go about it in such a manner that it benefits the entire country and not just itself. It must also make sure that the process is made permanent, and not just for this one election. The right way is to call an all-party meeting and discuss the need for a constitutional amendment in the matter. Such an amendment is needed because the fathers of our constitution never envisaged that the central and state elections would get separated and therefore did not anticipate the problems it would create in a multi-party democracy. The amendment should stipulate two things: state governments that fall prematurely will go under President's rule for the remainder of the five-year period. Secondly, if a central government falls, the state assemblies will stand dissolved automatically.

While the amendment sounds draconian, the fact of its mere existence on the statute books will ensure that it will almost never have to be invoked. For once it becomes clear to would-be defectors that defection will not yield a ministerial berth in the next government, almost the only motive that has spurred the fall of more than a hundred state governments in the past 40 years will vanish.