What is the issue?
- Elections in four states and one UT in March-April 2021 are suspected to have contributed to the second wave of Covid infections.
- This has again called for a well-reasoned debate on the concept of “one nation, one election.”
Why simultaneous elections?
- Simultaneous Elections refers to structuring the Indian election cycle so that elections to Lok Sabha and State Assemblies are synchronized.
- The idea has been around since at least 1983, when the Election Commission first mooted it.
- The concept of simultaneous elections needs to be debated mainly around five issues:
- Financial costs of conducting elections
- cost of repeated administrative freezes
- visible and invisible costs of repeatedly deploying security forces
- campaign and finance costs of political parties
- the question of regional/smaller parties having a level playing field
What about the cost factor?
- Directly budgeted costs of conducting elections are around Rs 300 crore for a state the size of Bihar.
- But there are other financial costs, and incalculable economic costs.
- Before each election, a “revision” of electoral rolls is mandatory.
- Each election means teachers missing from schools and colleges.
- The economic costs of lost teaching weeks, delayed public works, badly delivered or undelivered welfare schemes to the poor have never been calculated.
- The Model Code of Conduct (MCC) has economic costs too.
- Works may have been announced long before an election is announced.
- But tenders cannot be finalised, nor work awarded, once the MCC comes into effect.
- Add to this the invisible cost of a missing leadership.
- The time for Ministers' (politicians too) ministerial duties reduces sharply.
- There are also huge and visible costs of deploying security forces and transporting them, repeatedly.
- A NITI Aayog paper says that the country has at least one election each year; actually, each state has an election every year, too.
- So, these financial and economic costs are incurred repeatedly.
Will simultaneous elections impact regional parties?
- There are fears that the Centre might gain greater power and regional parties might be at a disadvantage.
- Fixed five-year terms for state legislatures in fact take away the central government’s power to dissolve state assemblies.
- But regional parties may be at a disadvantage because in simultaneously held elections, voters are likely to predominantly vote one way.
- This might give the dominant party at the Centre an advantage.
- Nevertheless, in any case, votes cast the same way may help regional parties tot up a nice enough number in Parliament to be a part of the central government.
What is the concern with instability?
- There is an argument that if a government loses its majority in the House, it necessarily means fresh elections.
- Firstly, with the current anti-defection law, it is virtually impossible for a ruling party/coalition to lose numbers.
- Secondly, even if a Prime Minister or Chief Minister loses a vote of confidence, those who voted against him/her have a majority.
- And their leader should become the Prime Minister or the Chief Minister.
- So, the dissolution of Parliament or Assembly is not a necessary consequence.
Source: The Indian Express
