Wherever we might be in other matters in the global rankings, we’re right at the top. India, where 800 million people still depend on government subsidies for a meal, has a stark contrast in running the most expensive democratic elections in the world. It is estimated that the 2019 congressional elections cost US$2 billion. In addition, parties and individual candidates spent an additional $5 billion. It is likely that in the national election in 2024 this amount will double.
The connection between money and politics is not calculated as a malignancy at the core of our democratic process. That is beej or the root of all corruption in India. If those supposedly making anti-corruption laws are the product of a corrupt system, how can the rest of society be clean? When parties receive funds in cash, or through “election bonds” from unspecified public donors, they will work, regardless of merit, to reward these ‘generous’ gifts . As candidates illegally spend many times the regulatory limit on elections, their priority is to milk the state to recoup their “investment.”
The tragedy is that all political parties are aware of this unrest, but happily collude to perpetuate it. No law since our Independence in 1947 has been enacted to successfully eliminate this scourge. But today’s rapid pace of digitization offers an opportunity to do just that. For this, however, past frauds must be removed, and a new transparent and accountable funding system introduced.
First, the deception. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s decision to cancel ads in 2016 was aimed at removing black money from the economy. In addition to causing untold catastrophes for ordinary people, the unprepared move has derailed the economy and, by some estimates, reduced our GDP growth rate by as much as 2%. . It failed simply because the rich and powerful, who had overwhelming amounts of black money, found enough ways to convert it into white money. But revealed, in the 2018 Budget, the government included in an electoral bond scheme, which allows the use of white money for the same nefarious purpose of providing political parties with uncountable amounts of money.
It is important to understand how this works. The electoral bond scheme allows individuals, associations and businesses to donate money to political parties through term electoral bonds issued by a bank. A year earlier, the government revised the regulations on cash donations by reducing the ceiling from Rs 20,000 to Rs 2,000 for unspecified cash donors. The facade for electoral reform was thus duly created.
What this purported ‘reform’ does, in fact, is just to allow donors a legitimate channel to anonymously provide unlimited funding to political parties. This was done through two last-minute amendments to the electoral bond plan. The first abolished the requirement for companies to declare their political contributions in their annual profit and loss statements. This deliberate veil of anonymity ensures that no citizen can know which business entity has given how much to which political party.
The Second Amendment removed the previous limit on corporate political sponsorship of 7.5% of a company’s average net profit over the previous three years. Previously, the government retroactively amended the Foreign Contributions Regulations Act 2010. Under the previous law, only such foreign companies could contribute to a political party where majority ownership was Indian. Now this bar has been removed.
The real effect of this stupid trick is that wealthy donors can, through legitimate banking channels, contribute cozy anonymous unlimited amounts to a political party without anyone except the beneficiary is wiser about this – and richer. The beauty of ‘legitimacy’ is shaken in the scale of its deception. Nothing really changed. Instead of cash transfers, the only difference is that unlimited amounts can still be paid to political parties through banking channels completely preserving the donor’s anonymity and without any any public disclosure. The donor-politician relationship remains intact. Ordinary citizens have no right to know what happened between them. The beneficiary will know who opened the purse strings for it and handle the “offer” accordingly. The sponsor, without any public scrutiny, can expect the government to receive the same “special” treatment, which he would otherwise receive through payments. cash. The whole so-called reform is completely shrouded in secrecy, thus preserving the old corrupt system in the guise of the new.
Ahead of the 2024 national elections, India is required to have a new system for transparent political funding.
The issue of the legality of electoral bonds has long been awaited before the Supreme Court. No one can deny that political parties in any democracy need funds, and that this amount is often more than the mandatory amount that a registered party worker may have to pay. The challenge is to have a system that takes this need into account, but effectively disrupts the relationship between money and politics beyond measure.
Here, the rapid digitization that we have witnessed in recent years can play an important role. What we need is a system where donations of even one rupee are done digitally and thus, can be accounted for in a transparent manner. A successful pilot of this form of funding exists in Bernie Sanders’ digital transparent crowdfunding system. The US Democratic Presidential candidate for the 2016 and 2020 elections shunned large donors and called for small denomination donors whose contributions are made digitally, possibly tracked and fully accounted for. Backed by a professional digital team, he’s been spectacularly successful, raising over $200 million through small online donations ($27 on average) by companies. people.
We need such a system in India, where all political contributions are in the public domain on one website, to protect our democratic credentials and root the connection. dangerous between pocket money and politics, especially since there’s no reason why it can’t be done. Why, in today’s digital age, even donations of Rs 2,000 are not taken into account?
What this urgent political reform requires is political will. Is our political system, for the benefit of future generations, ready for change?
Pavan K. Varma is an author, diplomat and former member of parliament (Rajya Sabha).
Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author.
