Simultaneous polls may hurt federalism

State and national polls at the same time can offer national parties a structural advantage, undercutting the space for regional parties

Are frequent elections across different levels of our federal polity (and the accountability burden that comes with it) a public inconvenience and a costly hindrance to governance and development?

Voters stand in line during polling for the seventh phase of the West Bengal assembly elections in Kolkata. (Representational Image / PTI)

This is the rationale offered for simultaneous state and national elections, or what the Prime Minister has termed One Nation, One Election (ONOE). India is permanently in election mode, the argument goes, with an average of two to five state assemblies going to polls every six months. This is an expensive proposition that incentivises political parties to remain permanently in election mode, focusing on short-term, vote-grabbing agendas and oiling the parties’ financial wheels rather than long-term development. Moreover, the model code of conduct, put in place in the run-up to the elections, disrupts the routine administrative and developmental activity of the Union and poll-bound states. And finally, given the length of each election cycle, security personnel, bureaucrats, and other officers, are kept away from their core tasks for prolonged periods of time.

Accept, for a moment, the proposition that frequent elections are too expensive and disruptive. Does it really merit a solution as radical as “one election” that will result in significant constitutional changes? Surely, more humble electoral reforms, such as enforcing transparency in political party financing, scrapping the opaque electoral bonds scheme, and reducing the time taken to conduct elections can help achieve these goals? What is really at stake here is not the cost that elections impose on India’s governance and development, but the checks and balances to power imposed by India’s federal compact. ONOE risks moving India closer to a “One Nation, One Party” model of politics by enabling the nationalisation of political competition.

The underlying motivation behind the proposal is undoubtedly centralising. The Union government’s high-level committee led by former president Ram Nath Kovind to make recommendations for holding simultaneous elections has no representatives from state governments or regional parties. This is surprising because states and regional parties will be most directly affected if the proposal were to be implemented. Moreover, the committee’s terms of reference mandate it to examine whether the proposal and relevant constitutional amendments would require ratification by the states. By implication, even the mere suggestion that such significant constitutional amendments can be made bypassing the states can seriously undermine their constitutional position as autonomous units of government by positioning states as subservient to the Union.

But the greater danger to federalism lies in the fact that ONOE could undermine multi-party-political competition, the real strength of our democracy. A commonly repeated argument against simultaneous polls is that it will blunt voter preferences and result in greater synchronisation of electoral outcomes at the state and national level, tipping the outcome in favour of the national party. This broad generalisation of electoral maths is untrue. The path to centralisation is more complex.

As India’s democracy has matured, states have emerged as primary sites of political competition. Regional parties have been far more effective in responding to regional and ethnic identity assertions, and their presence in national politics is linked to their ability to negotiate regional claims on the national stage. Voters have routinely expressed differing political preferences at the national and state level, based on their perception of the role regional parties can play. The resultant split-ticket voting is evident even in simultaneous elections. In Odisha in 2019, where state and national elections were held simultaneously, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) saw a significant gap in its vote share between state elections (33%) and national elections (38%). Crucially, the Biju Janata Dal (which won the state elections) secured a far lower vote share in 14 out of 21 constituencies in the national elections.

This differential voter choice is unlikely to change in the short run, precisely because regional parties are increasingly better placed than centralised national parties to respond to identity assertions. So, the argument of large-scale changes in electoral outcomes at the state level might be overblown.

But as I have argued in a paper with political scientist Neelanjan Sircar, simultaneous polls give the BJP (or any national party, for that matter) a structural advantage against regional parties in national elections. The “one election” model, strengthens the hand of the national party by simply undercutting the space for regional parties to form national alliances, and expend resources in presenting a credible national alternative. Essentially, simultaneous polls pave the way for one-party dominance at the national level. The change, therefore, might not be as visible in state capitals, as in Delhi.

Over time, this will allow the Union government to use its dominant electoral position to deploy fiscal and administrative resources to undermine state government autonomy, reducing them to deconcentrated administrative units. This is a trend we have witnessed in recent years, with a nationally dominant BJP. The long-term political consequence is that it allows the dominant national government to blur the distinction between states and the Union, opening the space for the national government to claim political credit for governance, even in state elections. This is how one-party dominance in states and the Union can be achieved in the long run.

So, let’s be clear. ONOE is not about better governance but about taking a big leap toward a unitary, one-party model of governance. It is fundamentally anti-federal and will end up being deeply injurious to our democratic health.

Yamini Aiyar is president and chief executive, CPR. The views expressed are personal