The world is full of clever answers in search of a genuine question. When talk of One Nation One Election (ONOE) began, it looked like a grand policy solution in search of a real problem. Either a remedy in search of a disease, or a medicine worse than the disease. It looked like a sequel to demonetisation, another brainchild of a modern-day Tughlaq’s penchant for something grand sans a vision or a blueprint.
Noting the alacrity with which the present regime has gone about pushing this scheme and reading the Report on Simultaneous Elections in India of the High Level Committee (HLC), I am now convinced that One Nation One Election is not just a quixotic yet harmless fantasy. It fits into a larger political design that has been in the works for long. Originating in the middle-class fantasy to save the republic from the public and the bureaucratic quest to evacuate democracy of its popular content, this design has now fused with the rulers’ desire to tame and defang democracy.
The 281-page report (18,345 pages with annexures) is a made-to-order document whose conclusions were written into its terms of reference. Just as the RBI was asked to invent virtues of demonetisation, the HLC was designed to discover the rationale for ONOE. Packed with pro-regime cheer-leaders of ONOE, the HLC has obediently filled in the details of the legal-constitutional formalities and administrative logistics required to roll it out.
The compulsion to discover a rationale makes for strange reading. The report claims that constant elections account for a loss of “about 300 days in an average year” in some states like Maharashtra (p.167). The ONOE would offer “equitable opportunity to political workers” (p.155) since the same leader won’t contest for MLA and MP. Not just that, ONOE would lead to “reduction in instances of hate speeches” (p.156). It would solve the problem of “voter........