This is Democracy – Episode 35: Democracy in India

Unknown Speaker 0:05
This is Democracy, a podcast that explores the interracial intergenerational and intersection of unheard voices living in the world’s most

Unknown Speaker 0:13
influential democracy.

Jeremi Suri 0:17
Welcome to our new episode of This is Democracy. This week, we’re going to talk about the development and current elections in the world’s largest democracy, the country of India. And we’re very fortunate to have with us my colleague and friend, a leading historian of India and teacher of Indian history and politics. Should we go Welcome to me. Thank you. Nice to have you here. Before we turn to Sumit we have Zachary series seen setting poem. What’s the title of your poems actually,

Zachary Suri 0:49
Indian So, Indian soul, let’s hear it.

Underneath tall trees that sink into the hazy mist in the dirt grass that seems to fill some of these streets like sand boxes, you colorful palaces, tombs to ancient kings, amongst the rivers that flow through the cities of the urban millions with long lines of traffic trying to cross over arched bridges, traffic that leans out of windows and shouts with the vibrancy of 1000 years. And it is a hopeful yearning traffic that remembers the intricacies of the highways, but lacks the constraints the burdens of remembering the rules, and hidden above the roof tops on stone balconies among monuments and arcs to the people who passed around them each day. Within the fibers that stretch through these great expanses of populists maternity makes it the music, the smell of the historic beginnings, within the strings across the subcontinent and the rising of the sun is a part of me that I know well. Does a part of me that loves spicy food talking loudly, a part of me that is the patchwork of a quilt sown and dedication to diversity, a part of me that loves adventure to the depth of the intellectual expanse, political theory and the son of a restaurant. In India, there is a section of my soul the piece of my future under the feature of assault, is the pattern elucidated over these humid clouds that covers scorching sun reveals itself in the laughs among a Babel of customs along the millions of bourbon yards across continents several thousand miles apart. And it is a full square meter of my soul that knows the way the birds sing in the jungle, the way the wind whistles along the river deltas and the winter mornings. And there’s the part of you which named me thumbtack me to the map of the human race under 1000 categories, but the same name, the same name through the mountains in the valleys, the stupas and the skyscrapers, the rivers, and the deserts. And there is beneath my skin, my hair, my breath, some Indian. So that’s it.

Unknown Speaker 2:38
Well, that was very good. Thank you.

Jeremi Suri 2:41
I love the Babel of the cousins that we just had our cousins visiting from India, and I could feel their babbling. What is your poem about Zachary?

Zachary Suri 2:48
My phone was really about my own personal connection to India, but also how, how closely tied our future and the future of India are?

Jeremi Suri 2:56
Yes, yes. So Sumit on that note, we often think of India and United States having many differences. But one similarity, of course, is traditions of democracy. Where do Indian traditions of democracy come from? And how do we understand the evolution of democracy in India?

Sumit Guha 3:15
Well, that’s not an not an easy question to answer in few words. Partly, of course, it would mean, it depends on what we mean by democracy, of course, and India. So let’s narrow it down to speak in terms of electoral democracy, the practice of having free and competitive elections, right

Jeremi Suri 3:38
and representative government, yes,

Sumit Guha 3:40
and yes, and which this idea on the sort of the government so that that, of course, is an idea that has sort of various kinds of roots in history. But India was, of course, the major colony of the British Empire, largest in population, and in many ways, very central to the British Empire in Asia and Africa,

Jeremi Suri 4:06
a jewel in the crown. So,

Sumit Guha 4:07
that

so that was, so the British introduce a limited franchise in India during the late 19th century, essentially as a way of getting managing urban government, and also on by spinning off a little bit of the taxation needed for the enlarged administration, on to local authorities, which thereby also reaped of political political opprobrium, of having to Hillary taxes. Show that was when they be first, but these are very limited elections with narrow franchises, overwhelmingly men of property, and with special provisions for people like Europeans, who had special you know, who had whose votes counted for much more in sort of Indian, certainly Europeans and so on. But so the mechanism mechanics of it start in the 20th century colonial period, which ends in 1947, with India’s independence. And from around from the end of World War One, the British begin introducing a wider electoral system, in which, towards the end, many millions of voters participate, but still on restricted franchises, typically, by communities, religious communities, or special constituencies, like business, right, European, etc. and not therefore, on a universal franchise. However, some of the mechanics of contested elections are worked out in this period. So that is, that, in essence, is one part of it. And the Indian nationalist movements, from their beginnings adapt to the idea of contest and contestation for political authority. And I think that is actually the the more important part of the birth of democracy in India, because it is perfectly possible to have, you know, mechanically functional elections, the Soviet Soviet Russia had them with very high turnout also, but with the results predetermined, right. So so the question is whether the participants take them seriously. And what happens between about World War One and World War Two in British India is that the participants Indian politicians begin actually contesting seriously and what is perhaps more important losing without resort to sort of other means,

Jeremi Suri 6:41
right, one of the tests of democracies Of course through the loser stay in the game he

Sumit Guha 6:44
has, exactly. So that’s so that is, but even the most what the sort of largest participation election that the British held in 1945 46 was a limited was by limited constituencies, and particularly it was the marketed by religious country constituencies, Muslims, non Muslims, Sikhs, Anglo Indians, and so on and restricted by property and other kinds of qualifications for franchise. So that’s, in a sense, the beginnings of it. The thing is that the that election, however, resulted in a political arm pass and the partition of the former British Empire in India into India and Pakistan.

Jeremi Suri 7:24
Right, right. And at that time, of course, we had east and west Pakistan, which and and he’s Pakistan now being Bangladesh. So many have claimed that the Congress Party, which for quite a long time, was the largest party in India and the party that produced most of the Prime Minister’s, the party of Joe, our Hall, narrow Indira Gandhi, that it was really a one party state. Is that a fair assessment of where India was until the prior last few decades?

Sumit Guha 7:53
Well, they the Congress Party certainly won a majority in the central legislation. India, India, the Indian Constitution is modeled on the British system, rather than the American supplementary system. It’s a parliamentary system. And whoever commands a majority of the votes in Parliament, or can secure a majority of the votes in parliament on crucial votes, is the head of the government and effectively the head of the executive. There’s a ceremonial president, but there is not. So it’s rather different from the separation of powers that characterizes the united states and countries that have followed the US model. Show the Congress Party certainly secured a majority in the elections at this at the federal level, through until 1977, which is the first one in which they say there was sort of actually went out of power. But they frequently lost local consultants to 20 elections from nine individual constituencies from 1952, when the first elections take place. And the last one control of major state in the 1957 elections when the communists were elected in Kerala, and overland alliance of parties led by the Communist Party was elected in Kerala. And it was the first sort of freely elected communist government anywhere in the world. So So in that sense, it was one party, but it was a one party government in which

Jeremi Suri 9:25
the voters choice counted. And what is interesting is that the Congress Party until 1984, never secured 50% of the national vote cast. It was consequently its winds were always predicated upon the division of votes, right, by the opposition amongst multiple contest I see. I see. So today with current elections in India, which we want to we want to talk about, how do we understand the party structure because the the party that’s in power Now, of course, it’s not the Congress Party. It’s the the BJP Party, which is a Hindu National Party. How do we understand the current party structure?

Sumit Guha 10:04
Well, it’s, it’s like there are actually there have been since at least since 1989, coalition governments in power at the Federal Center. So really, the BJP is leading a coalition, they secured a majority of seats, and this was something unprecedented in the federal legislature in the 2014 election. But there’s still, there’s that that was also as the head of a coalition. So there was a degree of pooling of votes. So currently, and at the same time, each of the states which and you know, larger Indian states are the population of major countries. Sure. So,

Jeremi Suri 10:45
so some Indian cities are the population.

Sumit Guha 10:49
But minor countries, but if you don’t count Switzerland or Belgium, but it’s suddenly so sobering to know state like West Bank goal has nearly 100 million people. Maharashtra has also closed on 100 million, as well, I guess, and pradesh is the biggest story that has, I think, over 200 million. So anyways, so a lot of the state, a lot of the states have an independent political dynamic, and their elections are dominated by regional parties I see whose support which have risen since the 1980s. And whose support to the federal government is often contingent on their own particular calculations in individual states. So So really the you have sort of right leaning a coalition headed by the BJP, right, leaning in the sense of being more strongly religious in its orientation. And more, sort of left, I suppose the opposite of right being left to but let’s say a more centrist coalition around the Congress, where is marked by various alliances as well. So this is how the, the kind of Indian elections have been for at least the last 30 years. And people who analyze polls, often speak of the index of opposition, unity, has a key element, right, in deciding outcomes.

Jeremi Suri 12:21
Right. Why should meet, have we seen the rise? In the last few decades of more of these, at least, superficially, religiously identifying parties and groups, the Congress Party, of course, it claimed to be a secular party. Yes. Is this is this part of a larger global phenomenon? What are the particular Indian characteristics to it?

Sumit Guha 12:41
Well, the the Hindu, right has had a long presence in Indian politics. It’s, it’s it had a precursor immediately after independence in the party. Johnson

Jeremi Suri 12:53
right. And the assassination. That was

Sumit Guha 12:56
even earlier on, but the birthday Johnson was formed after that. Okay. 1951 for the elections of nine, right. So it has had, it’s been an enduring strain. And the Congress was itself something. And the Congress actually began as as a gathering as a large conference of Indian nationalist politicians, which gradually coalesced into a political organization, undergone his leadership around 1919. And I should have mentioned perhaps, that one of the traditions that he in enshrined was that they would have internal elections, followed by party members for all party posts. Consequently, people who are very important in their locality, you know, Rogers, and big landowners and affluent lawyers and so forth, had to reconcile themselves to the fact that, you know, these sort of commonplace members, Clarks and petty and small farmers and so forth, could actually reject their offer of leadership, which I think was again a part of the psychological training for a democratic process, but coming back, so the Congress contained also a Hindu wing, especially in the 1950s. And that was a part of the way in which the more extreme elements of the similarly it contained elements of Muslim self assertion. But which were, however, rather muted after the, you know, the trauma of the separation of India and Pakistan with guns, very considerable violence and bloodshed that accompany that. But these elements were there. I think, from the 1980s, what happens is that the, that the left, the socialist left loses credibility with the rapid unwinding of the Soviet system. Yes. And that I think, is a worldwide phenomenon.

And at the same time,

that is a sort of a general rise of religious identification worldwide. There are a lot of forces both the you know, local to India, and otherwise, and as the Congress loses the specific identification of having the plan to build a socialistic pattern of society, at least in theory, sort of space opens up a political space opens up alternative forms of identity. There is also the rise of lower caste assertion. Yes. The Congress was very much at the Congress leadership was for many decades, while aspirational Lee Peggle Attarian, in its social composition, white collar, an upper middle to upper middle class, and typically also upper caste. So there’s a populist element to many of these other parts, as well. The BJP has drawn on a different kind of opinion, it unites the sort of grammatical elements together with a kind of streets religious Yes, he right, which, which the sort of some of the upper elements would in fact find accessing and Libyan and vulgar a frequent use of anti muslim rhetoric even though the Prime Minister himself Yes, yes. That has intense that intensifies in election, an electoral election periods and having an external enemy? Yes, is, but this has been specific to the 2014. And now the 2019 election campaigns, it was less pronounced in earlier time. 1989 91 there was a strong agitation around the specific religious site. Yes, robbery, Masjid. Right.

Jeremi Suri 16:37
Right. Right. So we have a student question about cast, you mentioned cast. This This question is actually from Isha Hussain. Let’s, let’s hear the question.

Unknown Speaker 16:49
What role does the caste system take in shaping Indian democracy? Do you think it weakens or strengthens democratic participation within the country? Very good

Jeremi Suri 16:58
question. Yes, that is a,

Sumit Guha 17:02
like most things about euro South Asia, or India, it’s sort of it’s complex. Well,

the cost system as

you know, intrinsically, in its in its classic form, it was undemocratic. It placed people into a hierarchy of a hierarchy of status and sometimes a hierarchy of occupation that they were supposed to pursue, the occupational part fell away, at least a century or more ago, but the hierarchy of status persisted. And it also persisted in forms, which were outlawed quite early on in the Indian under the Indian republics, such as the practice of untouchability, excluding people from particular areas, excluding them from the use of common wells or water sources and so on. Those might very occasionally now still occur in practice, but they are illegal and they can be pro and they can be in our prosecuted as far as instance that cost cost as a sort of identity has in fact become more prominent in the same way perhaps as ethnicity has become more prominent in many parts of the world. In fact, I wrote a book you know, in which argued that this has been the that the shift towards social classification as identity has superseded the role of the economic and the functional roles of casters hierarchy. So now it’s more like ethnic blocks competing many ethnic blocks competing within sort of poly centric. And there’s

Jeremi Suri 18:53
a structure that you do here

Sumit Guha 18:54
yes show. And a part of the political competition has, especially for the lowest and most stigmatized cast, that they’ve been able to form blocks that have had mobilize that have organized politically and this is particularly true a body in the most endearing of these has been the BSP, Belgians, a merge party. And the Belgian savage party has been very much a party of a lower caste block, which has strategically aligned itself with various other parties, depending on what its leaders are perceived as the electoral and political interests. So the GSB you know, Pradesh, which is its most important base has at one time aligned itself with the BJP with the in the right, and it has it another time aligned itself with the with the Congress, and in this election has actually aligned itself with a middle caste. Plus Muslim conglomerate known as the Samajwadi Party, with whom originally they were actually in a had quite a hostile relationship. Because the immediate interaction of lower costs to the lowest costs in rural areas is often with the middle costs, who are small landowners and farmers and often he almost as poor, but consequently are in a bit more in a more, you know, sort of fiercer competition. It might be somewhat like the relationship of poor whites and blacks in the rural south.

Jeremi Suri 20:20
It’s interesting, because these cast elements change over time, but they endure in certain ways to

Sumit Guha 20:27
Yes, well, it’s it’s partly by innocence, there is a massive vacation. Yes, there used to be hundreds of guards. Yes. And now there’s a massive vacation, they’re being consolidated into a block, which is important enough to be a voting bloc, right

Jeremi Suri 20:41
and in for educational institutions and other institutions that are often referred to as the scheduled classes. Right. Particular seats and privileges.

Sumit Guha 20:50
Right. Well, that arises from a provision in the 1951 constitute 9050 Constitution, which is that the names of particular communities were listed in a schedule of the country distribution. So these are the scheduled cast. Yes, yes. And similarly, you said you will tribes. Zachary, you had a question?

Zachary Suri 21:05
Yes. I was wondering how issues of economics and economic mismanagement play into the sort of racial, ethnic and economic divides in the country today today supersede them? Or they put are they placed below this interest?

Sumit Guha 21:22
Well, you know, it’s the thing about voting is that it’s an all or nothing choice. Yes. I mean, each voter and the now the not none of the above has also become an option in Indian and in the Indian ballot. Polls, you can the very few people actually do that. Right. But it’s an all or nothing choice. So the voter and the voter has multiple appeals, the individual voter has multiple appeals to his or her interests, loyalties, feelings, calculations. So it’s, it’s difficult to say what exactly. So you know, it’s serious economic mismanagement, like with really rapid inflation, are typically losers elections. It’s not something you can overcome with some other kind of appeal. But if there’s been recent interreligious violence in a locality, a constituency that may actually swing the margin and elections quite tightly, no, it’s a small marginal number of voters switching one or the other decide

Jeremi Suri 22:30
or a terrorist attack from Pakistan has recently occurred, which might help the BJP in this election? Yes.

Sumit Guha 22:38
Well, in 2008, I mean, those there have been, frankly, there’s been a sort of considerable history of terrorist attacks, which don’t, at the national level seem to interest affect elections as such. But the media penetration and social media penetration has increased enormously, even in the five years since the 2014. elections. So it’s hard to say what exactly is registering? Yes.

Jeremi Suri 23:07
So what are we seeing so far, Americans are not paying much attention right now. But but the largest democracy in the world has begun the three weeks of elections where more than six 700 million people will vote, almost three times as many as the number of people who vote in the United States. So what do you see happening so far?

Sumit Guha 23:29
It’s hard to say because they, the first round of voting has occurred. In fact, the number of people who voted on this first round is approximately is almost as many as voted in which almost as many as voted in the US election of 2018. Wow. Because and I have the numbers. And so there are 142 million eligible voters, of whom about three fifths to two thirds of actually voted. Wow. So that is something of the order of 90 million people. Right? I mean, so 90 million votes have actually been costs. And it

Jeremi Suri 24:03
is only round one.

Sumit Guha 24:04
This is round one for 91 seats. Well, so it’s there will be another. And the voter turnout has it’s been pretty high. The some of the highest has been in the eastern regions, for example, West Bengal has had 81%. And the sort of under up with a new in most places are above 60. Bihar is the low is the outlier at the low end with 50%. And what do you see happening? What do you what are your expectations for this election, which is crucially important for the future of South Asia and the world in many respects? Well, I don’t know. It is not possible to I have not been following it that closely in any way, even people whose profession it is to follow it and comment upon it are not certain at the kind of the media’s sort of panelists. And the the one kind of relatively independent study, which is conducted by the study a Center for the Study of developing societies and others and has been for a number of decades. It suggests that the ruling coalition will lose seats, but may still have enough to retain a majority in the federal legislature. However, that’s anyone’s. You know, that’s it’s a, it’s a semis. The other problem is that, you know, because you have single, you have over 500 540 or so, constituencies,

individual constituencies, and

it’s who gets a majority of the seats, right. And consequently, having you know, 100% of the votes in one constituency does not translate over to help your candidate in the next way.

Jeremi Suri 25:55
This is a familiar phenomenon for Americans where it’s not the total vote, it’s where your votes Yeah, exactly. Come in. Yes. So we have a question from Amanda kill crease and other student about the relationship between Indian and American democracy, which I think is a good question for us to turn to. This is Amanda killed Chris,

Unknown Speaker 26:14
what effect does democracy in America have on information in India and both negatively and positively?

Jeremi Suri 26:21
And particularly shimmied right now when the United States is going through its own difficulties with democracy now? What What effect does that have in India and vice versa?

Sumit Guha 26:35
I don’t think frankly, that the the model of the US Constitution is, you know, self consciously adopted by the Indian constitution writers in the in 1946 to 49 when they were drafting the Constitution, but they didn’t follow its brevity. For example. The Indian Constitution is one of the longest in the world.

Jeremi Suri 26:56
I have tried to read it. And it’s very difficult actually.

Sumit Guha 26:58
It’s written by a lot of lawyers and lawyers sitting in committees. Yes. So but so the inform the idea of having a constitution was something which was definitely you know, the first one is the American is the United States guns, and certainly the first endearing one is the United States Constitution. So it’s been something I’m a model. And the very idea of, you know, constitution is technically the formative the statement to constitute to put together a political community. The idea of a contractual political community is something which again, the United States was the first to do and followed shortly thereafter by France, which has ever had a whole succession of them, you know, in in its couple of hundred years since. So, as far as contemporary US politics, I don’t think it has very much of an effect insofar as there are they are, there are common traits, such as the rise of religiosity, or the rise of identity politics, I think that’s merely that India and the United States both both reflect and contribute to a global trend. But I don’t think there’s much that the United States directly as and there used to be a time when the CIA and the kind of hand of the dark hand of American conspiracy was occasionally invoked by politicians, particularly Indira Gandhi in the 70s. But that has passed away. So really, the US is not actually that important. So

Jeremi Suri 28:29
so that might bring us down, I think, to the good question for us to close on, we always like to close on an optimistic note it it does seem to me to me that one of the possibilities of direct us Indian work together on democracies among our young people more than ever before. I see. So many of my students in the US have Indian origins, like myself, and Zachary and our family. And so many Indians have spent time in the United States, is there or maybe the way to put this is, Are there things we can do to encourage encourage mutual learning, and mutual mutual democratic activism among these now more interconnected American and Indian communities? Ah,

Sumit Guha 29:14
I think it’s happening already. And I don’t think I would, I would avoid anything that has the suggestion of the United States promoting something typically counterproductive. Yes.

Well said, so. So you know, and in any case, you know, so the sort of media and the internet now a really global phenomena, and even the phenomena of sort of, you know, trolling or fake media manipulation, and so forth, all of these technologies are traveled. So really, I don’t think that there’s much I mean, that, you know, people of goodwill can speak and interact and so forth. But I can’t see that there’s anything such as such that, sure, and more than what is already happening through our educational institutions, yes. And exchanges and so on. The other real positive note actually says that, you know, there’s a classic political text by the tears, mentor Olson, who actually made a case, which, among other things, would argue against voting at all. Yeah. Which is when you have, for example, you know, we have had 91 parliamentary seats decided, in this last round of voting, about 190 million people voted, there’s upwards of a million voters per constituency, a single vote can be considered as pointless. But if every single voter thought of his or her vote is pointless, that nobody would vote, right, right. And yet, people due to a turnout, and they’ve been turning out in increasing numbers. Yes. And so this is what my friend Monica Banerjee of the London School of Economics has, in fact, argued, a is that there’s a sort of cultural and affirmative and participant sort of performative aspect to the elections, which has encouraged and mobilized people in such large numbers, to actually turn out to vote and in some cases, to travel back home, sure, considerable distances in order to vote. So on the positive side, that aspect of the electoral process is clearly very valued amongst the Indian voters, whatever the individual choices in the elections may be,

Jeremi Suri 31:28
it’s a great lesson for Americans to see how a society that is so much larger, and so and in many ways much poor, is able to bring more people out to vote and the things that are done to make it possible for them to vote. Zachary, do you find that that this is inspiring for you? Is this a topic of conversation? is the future of India connected to your conceptualization of the future of American democracy?

Zachary Suri 31:54
Yeah, yeah. Yes, I really do think that young people are, are engaged with India, I have experienced it first, have experienced Indian culture and Indians firsthand, just because the American communities that many of us grew up in are so intertwined with the Indian American communities. And I think that’s really important to how Americans understand and do

Jeremi Suri 32:17
well and I think that’s probably the the best that can be said about the future of global democracy. Cooperation as to meet reminds us in a way that’s not controlled by governments, but actually driven by by people. Xiaomi thank you for joining us today and sharing your insights. And Zachary, thank you for your poem. As always, thank you for listening to our episode of This is Democracy.

Unknown Speaker 32:46
This podcast is produced by the liberal lights development studio and the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Texas at Austin. Music In this episode was written and recorded by Harrison Lemke and you can find his music at Harrison Lemke dot com.

Unknown Speaker 33:01
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Transcribed by https://otter.ai