‘Indian Elections Are Too Noisy And Unpredictable'

Author Milan Vaishnav on the rise in political competition, why people vote for candidates with criminal backgrounds and the need for digital campaigning

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The upcoming general elections in India could well become the most expensive elections in the world. The combined US presidential and Congressional elections in 2016 cost $6.5 billion, while nearly $5 billion was spent during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. The overall expenditure in India might double this year, according to Milan Vaishnav, director and senior fellow of the South Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Vaishnav, who has written two books on political funding—one examining the rise of candidates with criminal records in politics, and another, Costs of Democracy: Political Finance in India—speaks to Forbes India about the hows and whys of the vast amount of money in politics, how this chips away at the notion of free and fair elections, and the need to clean up political funding. Edited excerpts:

Q This election is set to be the most expensive in the world. How did we get here?

The first is just simple population growth. Over time, the size of constituencies has exploded. So now if you are a Member of Parliament (MP), you have between 2 million and 2.5 million constituents to respond to. Just contacting them is quite expensive.

Second, we’ve seen an incredible rise in the level of political competition. To give you one statistic, the average victory margin in the Indian general elections over the last few times has been about 10 or 12 percent. In the US, in the last Congressional election, the average margin was 35 percent.

Then there is a rise of voter expectations, about what politicians and parties will hand out on the campaign trail. So we hear a lot about the distribution of money, jewellery, liquor, of other goodies.

Perhaps the most important one, in some ways, is that there is a relatively weak regulatory system to curb the use of money.

Q What are the consequences of so much money being spent?