INDIA’S DEMOCRACY: DECREASED RANKINGS

INDIA’S DEMOCRACY: DECREASED RANKINGS

Recent Instances of India’s decreasing Rank:

• Freedom House: downgraded India’s status from “free” to “partly free,” for the first time since 1997.
• V-Dem: India had ceased to be an electoral democracy in 2019. It instead became an “electoral autocracy.”
• Democracy Index: India has slipped in the 2020 Democracy Index to 53rd position. In 2018, India was ranked at 41. There has been significant “democratic backsliding” by the authorities in the past year, due to which it has been categorised as a “flawed democracy,” i.e., countries that hold free and fair elections but have significant weaknesses in aspects of democracy, such as where basic civil liberties are respected, but have an underdeveloped political culture and low levels of political participation.

Reasons for fall in rank:

1. Government policies
   • Citizenship (Amendment) Act 2019: step that many critics see as undermining the secular basis of the Indian state. The enactment in 2019 lead to riots, hence impacting India’s performance [EIU].
   • Issue of Jammu and Kashmir: Democracy Index mentioned the situation in Kashmir as “still very worrying”.
   • Frequent use of sedition charges: For example, over 7,000 people have been charged with sedition after 2014 and most of the accused are critics of the ruling party.
   • Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA): Recent amendment, which allows the state to designate individuals as terrorists.
   • Covid-19 pandemic: According to The Wire, 55 Indian journalists were threatened, arrested and booked by the Centre and state governments for their reporting on COVID-19.
2. Government crackdown
   • Crackdown on journalists:
     • Government crackdown: The Ex-India’s IT ministry ordered Twitter to block the accounts writing in favour of the farmer protests.
     • Political ideology: Some critics argue that journalists who are critical of the government are being labelled “anti-national” or “anti-state,” by supporters.
     • New IT Rules for intermediaries: The Information Technology (Guidelines for Intermediaries and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 has been widely criticized for posing an impediment to a thriving digital news media space.
   • Control over civil societies: Civil society organisations are being “muzzled,” specifically through the Foreign Contributions (Regulation) Amendment Act, 2020 to “constraint foreign contributions to NGOs within India”.
   • Losing autonomy of educational institutions: The space for ideas and dialogue in India is being constricted, and dissent punished, endangering scholars and students whose views are disfavoured by the ruling government.
3. Others:

• Increased cases of: Mob Lynching, Cow vigilantism, Moral policing, Fake news.
• Ayodhya Temple issue: The temple’s construction will further endear Hindu nationalist base [EIU].

Way forward

1. Government policy initiatives: Measures that could help reverse negative perceptions of democracy are robust pro-competition laws and enforcement; higher corporate taxes and a ban on offshore accounts in tax havens; election spending and donation limits, etc.
2. Strengthening democratic institutions: Enabling independent institutions to work independently, even if their decision is against what the executive would prefer.
3. Improving governance tools: Transparency, quality of the rules and their effective application.
4. Election Reforms: to ensure Right Leadership.
5. Increasing people’s participation:
   • Swiss Model: It is closest to direct democracy. It not only mandates that any changes in the constitution and important laws have to be approved by the people in a referendum, it even allows citizens to move their own amendments and seek a referendum on those if they are able to persuade enough of their countrymen to initiate such a move.
     • Referendums are also used by certain other countries: US for settling important issues such as allowing or prohibiting gay marriages or legalizing marijuana — and every state is free to do so; UK during BREXIT.
6. Others:
   • Inclusive structure: Ensuring a political structure which is more inclusive of the country’s minorities.
   • Dispute resolution: Deploying a more consultative and democratic method of resolving differences internally.
   • Cordial relations with opposition: evolving a more collaborative relationship with the parliamentary opposition to send out a message of national unity on key issues.

The recent step by the Law Ministry with the subject: “Monitoring Performance on Global Indices Democracy Index” is a step in the right direction.