Prime Minister Narendra Modi is in a hurry to make a law for ‘one country, one election’. Union Home Minister Amit Shah held a press conference on Tuesday, 17 September to give details of the achievements of the first 100 days of Modi’s third government. Along with everything else, he also said that the decision on ‘one country, one election’ will be taken in this Lok Sabha. A day later, the cabinet approved its proposal and the government announced that its bill will be introduced in the winter session this year.
Earlier, when the news of this came from government sources, senior Congress leader and former Home and Finance Minister P Chidambaram had claimed that this is not possible. Chidambaram said that it is not possible to conduct Lok Sabha and state assembly elections in the current Constitution. For this, at least five amendments will have to be made in the Constitution and the current central government does not have enough majority in the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha to make five amendments and decide to conduct all elections together.
On this issue, on one side there is BJP and its allies who are ready for simultaneous elections, while on the other hand 15 major parties of the opposition alliance have openly opposed it. In front of the high level committee headed by former President Ram Nath Kovind, all the opposition parties including the main opposition Congress, which have government in some state or are the main opposition party in the state assembly, opposed simultaneous elections across the country.
Apart from Congress, national parties like Bahujan Samaj Party, Aam Aadmi Party and CPM opposed this idea. Regional parties like Samajwadi Party, Trinamool Congress, DMK, CPI etc. are among those who opposed it. RJD, JMM, National Conference, Bharat Rashtra Samiti, Akali Dal etc. did not give any opinion on this but it is believed that these parties will oppose this idea presented by the BJP government.
Now the question is how will the central government pass the ‘One Country, One Election’ law despite opposition from so many parties? Will the government use force? It is important to note that this will not be a normal working law that can be passed and implemented despite opposition from the opposition. Despite being passed by the Parliament, it will be implemented only if all the opposition parties participate in it.
Opposition parties are in power in many small and big states of the country. The central government cannot suddenly dissolve them by making a law or postpone the elections. If the opposition parties do not agree to this, then it will be almost impossible to implement it. That is why it is surprising that instead of trying to communicate with the opposition and build consensus, Amit Shah announced that he will make a law for this in the Lok Sabha itself and after that the government approved its proposal and also issued a deadline to present it in the winter session.
The reality is that there are many complexities in this entire process. The term of the Delhi Assembly is till 23 February next year. From then till December 2028, the term of the assemblies of 13 states is. Elections will be held in these states before the 2029 Lok Sabha elections. What will be the arrangement for their elections? In the states where elections are to be held in the next four years, will there be elections for a shorter term or will the elections be postponed by imposing President’s rule after the completion of the term? The suggestion received by the government says that a law will be made in the Parliament to conduct simultaneous elections and 2029 will be considered as the ‘fixed date’.
After the President’s signature, its notification will be issued. After that, the term of all the assemblies that will be elected will be considered till 2029 only. This will mean that the Uttar Pradesh assembly will be elected in March 2027 but its term will not be five years, but two years! Assembly elections will be held in 2026 in three big opposition-ruled states, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Will the ruling parties in these three states, Trinamool Congress, DMK and CPM, agree that the term of the assembly should be only three years! From the attitude of the government, it seems that it has to do this work without disturbing the cycle of Lok Sabha elections and has to do it suddenly.
But if the government does it with the consent of all instead of doing it suddenly and forcefully and instead of conducting all elections together, it works on the formula of conducting them in phases, then it will be very easy. In America, all elections are conducted in two phases. Once the President is elected and then there are mid-term elections. On this formula, in India, elections of half the states can be conducted along with the Lok Sabha and after that, elections of half the states can be conducted in the second phase.
With this, voters will not have to wait for five years to express their opinion. It is worth mentioning that elections are held in Arunachal Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, Sikkim, Jammu Kashmir, Haryana, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Telangana, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh along with the Lok Sabha elections or six months before or after it. Karnataka elections are held a year before the Lok Sabha elections and Delhi elections are held 10 months later. These elections can be held in the same phase as the Lok Sabha elections. Another advantage of holding elections in two phases is that if the government falls in the states or the assembly is dissolved due to any reason, then one will not have to wait for long for re-election. The election will be held in the nearest phase. But it does not seem that the government is ready to consider the rational formula of holding elections in the entire country in two phases.
The central government is adamant that all elections should be held together. There is no solid logic behind this. The argument that work will come to a standstill due to repeated elections and imposition of code of conduct is useless. Because even if the current system continues, the code of conduct will be imposed only twice in every state in a period of five years. Once for the Lok Sabha elections and the second time for the assembly elections. Therefore, there is no meaning in the talk of work coming to a standstill due to code of conduct.
Elections are being held in two states right now, so what work has come to a standstill? The central government has taken three big decisions for public welfare in the middle of these elections. Who stopped it? In states too, all decisions are taken in emergency situations and old work is going on. If the Election Commission was competent, the election process in the states would have been completed in a month. If one or two months are spent in the code of conduct in the 60-month tenure, the sky will not fall.
In the formula of conducting all elections simultaneously, a law will have to be made that the assembly cannot be dissolved midway, which cannot be called democratic in any case. If such a law is not made then the tenure of the assemblies will be short or a coalition government will be formed or the states will have to live under President’s rule. So, the government should give up its stubbornness and move towards consensus and scientific and logical methods.