Tag Archives: SIR

authoritarianism, Democracy, Politics, Right watch

“SIR” Is a Process of Mass Disenfranchisement

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The Solution

After the uprising of the 17th June Election of 2024

The Secretary of the Writers Union Prime Minister’s Office

Had leaflets distributed in the Stalinallee the message sent out via Nagpur

Stating that the people

Had forfeited the confidence of the government

And could win it back only

By redoubled efforts. Would it not be easier

In that case for the government

To dissolve the people

And elect another? – [Courtesy Bertolt Brecht]

The way things are going with the SIR, we are heading for the regime “electing its people” – with the full participation of the Opposition parties, who despite the knowledge of the process, have become unwilling participants. Not knowing how to respond, they seem to be running around like headless chickens. “Vote Chori” and the so-called “Special Intensive Revision” (SIR) are closely tied together and though Rahul Gandhi seems to have got the import of what this means, reports suggest that RSS “sleeper cells” within and outside the Congress Party are hyperactive now, trying to undermine the campaign against vote chori. Some INDIA bloc parties have even openly distanced themselves from it. Continue reading “SIR” Is a Process of Mass Disenfranchisement →

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Democracy For The Few ?

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Is Bihar being turned into a test case of disenfranchising people?

Representational Image. Image Courtesy: Flickr

India pledged to usher in a democracy with universal adult franchise.

It was the late 1940s, when India, a newly independent nation, whose less than 10% population was then literate, embarked on this unique experiment, unheard of in those times.

The architects of Independence rejected all the Western prescriptions that openly said that .’.. India had no democratic future‘ (Winston Churchill) or ”monarchial arrangement best suited the Asian people‘ (British Prime Minister Clement Attlee to Nehru, 1949), and (to quote a student of history) ‘met the imperial argument on direct terms, firmly believing in the possibility of creating democratic citizens through democratic politics.’ (India’s Founding Moment: The Constitution of a Most Surprising Democracy by Madhav Khosla)

What is worth emphasising is that all those great leaders who shaped a forward-looking Constitution were on the same page when it came to granting the right to vote. For example, B.R Ambedkar, who was chairman of the Drafting Committee of the Constitution, firmly believed that ‘To limit the franchise, was to misunderstand the meaning of democracy ... ‘

None of them dithered over this provision despite knowing well that even the Western countries had not fully adopted universal adult franchise. Remember, Switzerland granted the right to vote to women only in 1971.

Much water has flown down the Ganges, the Jhelum, the Brahmaputra, the Godavari or the Kaveri.

A good 75 years after the adoption of the Constitution (1950), today we are faced with a challenge that at first looks unbelievable, the present ruling dispensation seems to have embarked on a journey in an exactly reverse direction. [Read the full article here : https://www.newsclick.in/democracy-few]