[This follows: Your vote does not count. The related articles are, ‘You did not vote!’, ‘You did not vote!’: Part II]
Republic
of India has had valuable experience of nearly sixty years working as a
representative parliamentary democracy.
The experiences have shown the strengths of its political system, while
clearly exhibiting its weaknesses. One
of the key weaknesses is that Indian political parties do not necessarily
follow internal party democracy. And
unless this is legislated and enforced through an external watchdog like
Election Commission it can be safely surmised that political parties of India
would not implement it voluntarily.
Already a majority of Indians show disenchantment with Indian political
system while the faith in the governance is eroding.
Indian
political parties have escaped scrutiny of their inner workings and trappings,
thereby undermining Indian democracy.
Indian political parties’ method of selection of candidates and election
of its leaders is not transparent, and in fact has all the features of autocratic
machinations that are rooted in the very antithesis of a democracy. These selection methods promote nepotism,
sycophancy, promotion of mediocrity, suppression of diverse point of view,
unilateralism, apotheosis of certain individuals or families, idolization and
veneration of leaders beyond what is considered respectable and reasonable.
The
role of political parties in India now stands ambiguous, escaping
accountability while getting away with undemocratic methods in choosing the
candidates and electing the leaders. It
is generally assumed that ‘primary function of political parties was to link the
citizens with the government’ [Sartori].
Yet, a common man in India finds himself disconnected with the
government essentially because the political party is acting as the
barrier. Instead of facilitating that
link, Indian political parties are monopolizing the access to government
denying the common man his participation in the governance of the country.
