Indian main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party leader Lal Krishna Advani addresses a party members meeting for the forthcoming parliamentary elections, in Calcutta, India, Friday, March 6, 2009. The elections for the Indian parliament’s lower house will be staged across the country in five different phases between April 16 and May 13. Poster in the background shows a chariot driven by Hindu god Krishna, carrying Arjun, a mythological character from Hindu epic Mahabharata. (AP)
 

The die is cast. Over 700 million Indians will elect a new parliament in a five-phase poll spread over a full month between April 16 and May 16.

With no clear winner on the horizon, the outcome most certainly will result in another patchwork quilt of a coalition of some two dozen groups with little in common, bar a desire to share power. 

Yet, the 15th General Election in the world’s largest democracy will still mark the triumph of hope over the forces of chaos and anarchy.

 Despite endemic poverty, widespread illiteracy, rampant political and bureaucratic corruption, India somehow has managed to stick to representative rule since Indepen-dence more than 60 years ago.

That in itself is no mean achievement for a people whom Winston Churchill considered unfit to govern themselves.

His fear that if the British left, India would break into several pieces, falling back into the "barbarism and privations of the Middle Ages" was meant to serve the argument against granting freedom to India, by common agreement dubbed "the jewel in the British Crown."

 For sure, the odds were stacked against newly-independent India back in 1947. But thanks to the sagacity of the founding fathers of the republic and the ingrained stoicism – some call it typical Hindu fatalism – of its people, a nation of many religions and regions, riven by sharp differences of caste and language, and huge socio-economic disparities, has managed to hold together.

Indeed, India was like an elephant which moved slowly but steadily towards its ultimate destination, namely, securing for its people economic and social redemption with dignity and justice.

It is a measure of the success that the hitherto despised scheduled castes or untouchables now have come into their own. The chief minister of UP, the largest state in the union which sends every seventh member to parliament, is a scheduled caste and a woman to boot.

Also, the chief justice of India is a Dalit, having risen from humble origins in Kerala. The Prime Minister is a Sikh, a minority community numbering a little over 1% of the population. And the Vice-President of India is a Muslim, the largest minority community with over 14% share in the population.

There have been other notable gains, too. Life expectancy was barely 31 years when India got freedom. It is now close to 64 years. Sixty years ago, it was a predominantly unlettered country with the literacy percentage below 30%. Now it is over 70%, with female percentage touching 56.

 Infant mortality rate has come down in the last six decades due to better primary health facilities, rising awareness and improved living conditions even in villages. But, undoubtedly, there is a lot that still needs to be done. For one, a good one-third of Indians still live below the poverty line. That is, they subsist on less than US$1 a day. Then there are huge income disparities, with the rich accounting for an inordinately large share of the national wealth.

Above all, India’s political class is widely perceived, and not without reason, to be corrupt, and now, increasingly criminal as well.

A good number of members of the outgoing Parliament have criminal cases, including those for murder and kidnapping, registered against them. Ditto at the state level.

Whatever the reason, there is no denying the fact that unaccounted money powers the electoral system, making up nearly 90% of political funds, even though it is now legal for businesses and corporate houses to make political donations.

The generators and givers of black money fund politicians in return for state patronage in the form of licences, permits and cheap land, etc.

However, on balance, it is undeniable that despite many failings India has made all-round progress. Yes, there is poverty, there are beggars on the street, but it is rare for an Indian to go to sleep hungry.

The government’s warehouses are chock-full with foodgrains – indeed both wheat and rice are being exported to relieve the burden of storage.

Ironically, it is the poor rather than the rich who participate most enthusiastically in the periodic electoral exercise.

The educated middle classes, perennially lamenting the degeneration of politics, play truant on polling day, while the poor and the weaker sections turn up in large numbers from early morning to exercise their constitutional right to elect the next government.

Organising the election in a country of such complexity and such geographic vastness is a gigantic task. About 714 million Indians are eligible to cast their vote at 141,402 polling stations in five phases between April 16 and May 13.

Over four million public servants, including school teachers, and more than two million security personnel will be on poll duty.

This is the first election where over 90% of the voters will have photo election cards to prevent bogus voting. And of course the use of electronic voting machines throughout the country is another feature which makes the electoral exercise nearly foolproof.

So in the next 10 weeks or so, the biggest festival of democracy on Planet Earth will be played out to a cacophony of several sounds and colours. Aside from the official expense of nearly US$250 million on organising the poll, various parties and candidates in the fray will roughly spend some US$1billion to try and win the trust of voters.

The voter, on his part, will keep his own counsel till the ballot boxes are opened and votes counted on May 16. That is the day on which the real numbers game will begin.

It being absolutely certain that no party or coalition will get a clear 272 seats out of the 543 in the Lok Sabha, furious efforts at government formation would begin as soon as the votes are counted and results announced.

As of now, no one seems to be a clear favourite for the post of prime minister, though officially the Congress-led UPA is persisting with Manmohan Singh while the BJP-led NDA is projecting L.K. Advani.

But, the emergence of a dark horse from one of the smaller groups bagging the coveted crown cannot be ruled out. Inscrutable indeed are the ways of the Indian voter.