Democracy in danger: True or false?
On India’s 76th birth anniversary as an independent country, it would be apposite to weigh in on a topic that has been making the rounds for quite some time. Has India’s democracy devolved or, as some would prefer to put it, degenerated into an “electoral autocracy”? Let us consider both positions on this issue.
First that of the government. Prime Minister Narendra Modi likes to project India not only as the largest democracy, which it obviously is, but also as the “mother of democracy”. Last November, just before India assumed the presidency of G20, our education minister, Dharmendra Pradhan, launched a glossy coffee table book published by the Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR), claiming that the “democratic ethos” was “ingrained in India since the dawn of civilisation”. Pradhan underlined how Modi, in his address at the 76th United Nations General Assembly, had claimed: “India is not just the oldest democracy but also the mother of democracy.” Of course, what exactly is meant by democracy was not clearly defined. We know that despite the consultative and participative autonomy at the level of India’s so-called “village republics”, the most prevalent form of government throughout our history, there has been some version or the other of monarchy. During Muslim rule, the power of the potentate was so unrestricted that it earned the sobriquet of “oriental despotism”.
But, coming to present times, a chorus of voices, mostly in the West but also in India, has been drumming up the narrative of “democratic backsliding” in India under Modi’s watch. Scores of articles condemning India have been published by top news and media outlets of the world, including “the usual suspects”—CNN, BBC, The New York Times, Washington Post, The Guardian and Financial Times—plus a host of more respectable journals such as Foreign Policy and the Journal of Democracy.
Furthermore, global platforms are abuzz with condemnatory judgments emanating from international oversight institutions. Freedom House, in its Democracy under Siege report (2021), downgraded India from “free” to “partly free”. It also accused the Modi administration of carrying out concerted endeavours to muzzle voices of dissent in the corridors of media and academia. That same year, V-Dem gave India a negative rating in its Democracy Report 2021, branding the nation an “electoral autocracy”. According to V-Dem, the Modi-led BJP regime has misused the provisions of sedition, defamation and counterterrorism as potent instruments to quell its critics and opponents. Skip a couple of years to 2023. V-Dem calls India “one of the worst autocratisers in the last 10 years”, placing it in the bottom 40-50% on its Liberal Democracy Index at rank 97. We fare even more poorly at rank 108 on the Electoral Democracy Index, and stand at 123 on the Egalitarian Component Index.
Not far behind is the Economist Intelligence Unit, which considers itself a global arbiter on matters such as democratic robustness. India was demoted in their 2023 Democracy Index to 46th place. Is there any point mentioning that quite similarly, in the World Democracy Matrix 2020, very unlikely states such as Sierra Leone, Timor-Leste, Guyana, Malawi, Albania, Liberia, Kenya and Colombia rank higher than India, which was ranked as low as 85 of the 176 countries measured? India is not even a “Deficient Democracy”, let alone a “Working Democracy”, according to this index put out by the University of Würzburg , which labels the country as a “Hybrid Regime”.
Suddenly the familiar refrain echoes across the world: “Democratic backsliding.” A phrase that encapsulates the power these regulators wield over how we are perceived, with them alleging that the very fabric of India’s democratic ethos is undergoing a gradual, inexorable unravelling. International agencies, exercising their metrics as analytical blades, slice through the lived experience of 1.4 billion Indians. In the global arena, India stands as both subject and spectacle, grappling with the apparently weighty implications of these downgrades as if these agencies are the ones determining the democratic destiny of this great nation. Ironically, the very States which ruled the world as brutal colonial powers are today the watchdogs of human rights and democracy.
A slew of influential US politicians, including senators and members of the US Congress, have also been trying to take India down based on its track record on democracy and minority rights. The most visible of these was former US president Barack Obama, whose remarks to CNN were so well-circulated—and countered by the BJP top brass—that they don’t need repetition. So, what is the truth? Is democracy in danger in India under Narendra Modi? This question assumes added importance because we are facing a general election next year that will determine who forms our government at the Centre.
Before offering a counter, let us give the devil, or in the present instance, the choir of those largely Western or Indian anti-Modi and anti-BJP decriers of Indian democracy, their due. Yes, it is possible to argue that India’s freedoms have diminished under the Modi-led BJP government—that there is greater intolerance of dissent, more concerted attempts to control if not muzzle the media, a deliberate marginalisation of Modi’s critics and opponents, attempts to take over or control institutions, and targeted social media bashing or hounding of critics.
Furthermore, we have seen unprecedented centralisation of power and the promotion of the personality cult of Modi and the polarisation of the public sphere, where there is hardly any middle ground left for one to take issue-based or even independent positions. Forget about speaking truth to power; just speaking the truth as one sees it has become somewhat hazardous for all, be it an academic or public intellectual. Worst of all, Parliament itself has become dysfunctional, thus undermining the most important pillar of our democracy. Let us suppose, by way of our purvapaksha, that these allegations are true in some, whether small or large, measure.
In the second part, we will consider the uttarapaksha, or the response to these charges or allegations. To begin with, who would deny that Modi has done more for India’s growth, prosperity, welfare and international standing than most of his predecessors? But is “electoral autocracy” the prerequisite for such progress?
(To be concluded)
Makarand R Paranjape
Professor of English at JNU
SLUG: RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE
(Views are personal) (Tweets @MakrandParanspe)