Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Sept 29: The Law Commission is claimed to be working on a formula to sort out a seemingly arduous task to synchronise all assembly polls with the Lok Sabha elections by extending or reducing the tenure of various state Assemblies from 2029 Parliamentary polls onwards.
As the government has already set up a high-level panel to explore simultaneous polls for Lok Sabha, state assemblies, and local bodies, the Law Commission may also be asked to include the third tier of elections along with its current mandate for national and state polls.
Official sources said on Friday that the law panel was devising a mechanism to ensure a common electoral roll for Lok Sabha, assemblies, and local bodies to reduce cost and use of manpower for an almost identical exercise carried out now by the Election Commission and the state election commissions, the sources added.
For synchronising various assembly polls to ensure both state and Lok Sabha elections are held together from 2029, the Commission, under Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi, may suggest reducing or enhancing the tenure of legislative assemblies. A mechanism is being devised to ensure that once Lok Sabha and assembly polls are synchronised, voters go to polling booths just once to cast their ballot for both elections.
The sources said the Commission was favourably disposed to the idea of simultaneous Lok Sabha and Assembly elections and was working out modalities for the smooth conduct of the mammoth democratic process. But The high level committee set up by the government under the chairmanship of the former president Ram Nath Kovind has also been tasked with recommending how local body polls (panchayat, municipalities, zila parishad) could also be held along with Lok Sabha and state Assembly elections.
The Law Commission is learnt to be working on a suggestion to hold the three-tier polls in two phases in a year, with Lok Sabha and assembly polls in the first phase and the local bodies polls in the second phase. This, the sources said, is a practical approach keeping in mind the varied climatic conditions in the country.
In August 2018, the previous Law Commission endorsed the Modi government’s proposal to hold simultaneous polls to Lok Sabha and state assemblies, saying it would prevent the country from being in constant election mode. It however sought further public discourse on the issue before arriving at a final decision.
The panel in its draft report had also said the exercise cannot be held in the present constitutional framework, and suggested changes required to carry out the two sets of polls together.
The idea of simultaneous polls at least to the Lok Sabha and the state Assemblies, which used to be the practice till 1967 before emergence of regional parties disrupted the schedule, was being discussed for the last five years or so and is part of the ruling BJP’s election manifesto, but several practical problems crop up in the way besides being considered an attack on the federal structure of the country and the very purpose of three-tier power distribution system.
The next Lok Sabha election is due to be held before June 16, 2024. If the simultaneous elections idea bears fruit and is ratified and implemented, this would curtail the terms of all Legislative Assemblies barring those of four States — Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Odisha, and Sikkim. The election cycles for these four States have coalesced with elections to the Lok Sabha over time. If simultaneous elections are held in 2029, it would require a similar exercise of curtailment or extension of Assembly terms.
As many as 17 States would see their Assembly terms being truncated by close to a year and a half, with the terms of the Assemblies of Karnataka, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Tripura, Himachal Pradesh, and Gujarat being truncated by close to three and a half years or more.
The government has touted the need for simultaneous elections as a cost-saving exercise. A report by the Law Commission in 2018 stated that the expenses for Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in any State are more or less the same. It argued that conducting elections together would reduce the costs by half. However, reports such as this treat election expenditure as “wasteful”, disregarding the multiplier effect and the economic impact of conducting elections on sectors such as transport, printing, media, and infrastructure.
Many such reports also do not consider the import of simultaneous elections on the specificity of the legislative and governance tiers in India. Cumulatively, India elects 543 Lok Sabha representatives, more than 4,100 Assembly legislators, representatives to 89,194 urban wards, and nearly 31.89 lakh elected panchayat representatives spread across three tiers of the Panchayat system — village panchayats, panchayat unions, and district panchayats. Each of these tiers has its own roles and responsibilities. The sheer number of representatives across the three tiers points to the importance of each tier and the need for contestation to cater to the specific needs of the voters.
For example, if a voter is bothered about garbage management in her locality, she would use her power to elect a candidate who is best suited to solve the issue in the local ward. On the other hand, MPs and MLAs are representatives of larger constituencies and are elected to enact laws on matters relating to the Union government and the State, respectively.
Besides curtailing the terms of Assemblies much before their tenure, holding simultaneous elections could also mean that the various issues concerning these three tiers could be subsumed under just one mandate for the voter. This would militate against federalism and the very structure of three-tier governance. The committee must take a substantive look at the federal aspects of Indian democracy before envisaging simultaneous elections.
